THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

RIVERSIDE 


THE 

PRINCIPLES  OF  SCIENCE 

A  COLLEGE  TEXT-BOOK 


BY 
WILLIAM  FORBES  COOLEY,  B.D.,  PH.D. 

INSTRUCTOR  IN  PHILOSOPHY  IN  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY 
AUTHOR  OF  "THE  INDIVIDUAL,"  ETC. 


NEW  YORK 
HENRY  HOLT  AND  COMPANY 

1912 


COPYRIGHT,   1912, 
BT 

HENRY  HOLT  AND  COMPANY 


CAMBLOT   PRESS,    18-20  OAK   STREET,    NEW    YORK 


PREFACE 

This  little  book  is  an  attempt  to  bridge  the  chasm, 
which — at  least  for  undergraduates — too  often  lies 
between  scientific  and  philosophical  studies.  Its  aim 
is  to  show  how  the  inquiries  of  physical  science  lead 
inevitably  to  questions  and  problems  which  transcend 
the  field  of  present-day  science,  that  is,  to  questions 
of  philosophy.  Beginning  as  it  does  with  a  critical 
study  of  the  fundamental  intellectual  methods  of 
science,  it  may  on  the  one  side  be  regarded  as  a 
continuation  of  the  student's  study  of  logic;  while, 
as  the  metaphysical  questions  become  more  numer- 
ous and  prominent,  it  may  on  the  other  be  considered 
an  introduction  to  philosophy.  The  effort  has  been 
to  start  with  what  the  undergraduate  may  properly 
be  expected  to  be  familiar  with,  and  to  carry  the 
inquiry  forward  along  the  line  of  the  natural  develop- 
ment of  the  subject-matter — the  principles  of  science 
— to  those  fundamental  problems  of  metaphysics 
and  epistemology  which  are  either  the  complement 
or  the  foundation  of  all  scientific  knowledge.  It  is 
not  maintained  that  this  approach  to  philosophy  is 
the  best  for  all  classes  of  readers;  but  the  author 
believes  it  to  be  the  one  most  natural  and  most  use- 
ful for  the  average  college  student, 
iii 


iv  PREFACE 

My  indebtedness  to  Jevons'  large  and  admirable 
work  on  this  subject  will  be  evident  from  the  text 
and  footnotes.  I  have  also  received  valuable  sug- 
gestions from  my  colleagues  in  Columbia  University, 
Professors  Dewey,  Woodbridge,  and  Jones,  and 
Mr.  H.  G.  Hartmann. 


CONTENTS 

PART  I— METHODS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  CHARACTER  OF  SCIENTIFIC  KNOWLEDGE— MOTIVES        3 
II.  PRINCIPLES— THE  Two  FUNDAMENTAL  METHODS      24 

III.  POSITIVISM .42 

IV.  SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY 58 

V.  CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH        .       .       .       .       .       .07 

PART  II— RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

VI.  MATTER — QUANTITY    .        .               .       .       .  79 

VII.  ENERGY — DYNAMISM       .        .        .        .                .  108 

VIII.  MECHANISM 135 

IX.  LAW— VALUES         . 153 

X.  EVOLUTION 173 

PART  III— BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

XI.  POSTULATES .  195 

XII.  RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD           ....  203 

XIII.  THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD 219 

INDEX          » -  243 


PART  I 
METHODS 


_'      CHAPTER  I 

CHARACTER   OF   SCIENTIFIC 
KNOWLEDGE— MOTIVES 

How  Science  is  Distinguished  from  other  Knowl- 
edge.— It  is  a  common  impression  that  science  is 
knowledge  of  things  of  which  ordinary  persons  are 
ignorant.  There  is,  of  course,  some  ground  for  this 
impression,  for  most  men  are  only  bewildered  by 
talk  of  foot-pounds  and  amperes,  chromosomes  and 
neurones;  but  science  need  not  be,  and  at  the  outset 
rarely  is,  occupied  with  what  lies  beyond  ordinary 
experience  and  thought.  It  is  a  matter  of  common 
and,  indeed,  immemorial  knowledge,  for  example, 
that  water  at  rest  presents  what  seems  to  be  a  level 
surface;  and  ever  since  the  tune  of  Hero  of  Alexandria1 
in  the  first  century,  if  not  before,  it  has  been  a 
familiar  fact  that  a  tube  provided  with  a  piston  and 
suitable  valves  (a  pump)  will  draw  water  to  a  con- 
siderable distance  above  its  former  level.  Yet  it 
was  with  just  such  every-day  facts  as  these  that  the 
science  of  hydraulics  began.  The  plain  man  and  the 
physicist  alike  know  that  water  will  rise  in  a  pump. 
Usually  it  is  only  at  a  more  or  less  advanced  stage 

1  Hero  (or  Heron)  was  an  eminent  Greek  mathematician  who 
lived  in  Alexandria  about  100  B.  C.     He  was  noted  also  for  his 
writings  on  physics,  one  of  which  mentions  a  steam  driven  machine. 
3 


4  METHODS 

that  inquiry  comes  upon  phenomena  that  are  quite 
unknown  to  men  in  general. 

The  first  remark  then  to  be  made  as  to  the  dif- 
ferentia of  scientific  knowledge  is  that  it  is  not  dis- 
tinguished by  its  subject-matter.  Science  as  such  is 
not  any  particular  body  of  information,  such  as 
physics,  nor  even  any  group  of  these,  as  the  physical 
sciences.  It  is  not  necessarily  concerned  with  waters 
and  metals,  stars  and  living  bodies;  that  is,  with 
nature  in  the  narrow  sense.  It  may  deal  with  equal 
propriety  with  the  phenomena  of  mind,  and  then  we 
have  the  science  of  psychology;  and  it  may  deal  with 
pure  abstractions,  or  aspects  of  things,  and  then  we 
have  the  various  mathematical  sciences  and  the 
science  of  logic.  Science  differs  from  other  knowl- 
edge, not  in  what  it  treats  of,  but  in  the  way  it  treats 
its  subjects,  that  is,  in  its  methods 2  and  as  a  conse- 
quence, in  (1)  the  precision,  (2)  the  superior  certainty, 
(3)  the  universality,  and  (4)  the  organized  character 
of  its  intellectual  results. 

(1)  Scientific  knowledge  is  precise,  or  definite, 
knowledge.  It  is  acquainted,  at  least  in  a  measure, 
with  the  conditions,  the  bounds,  and  the  quantities 
of  its  object.  It  is  aware,  not  only  that  water  will 
rise  in  a  pump,  but  that  it  will  rise  thirty-four  feet, 
and  no  more.  For  it  the  statement  that  the  piston 
sucks  the  water  is  not  sufficient;  it  knows  that  the 
suction  takes  place  because  the  piston  exhausts  the 
air  from  the  pipe,  leaving  the  water  in  its  submerged 
foot  without  pressure  from  above,  while  the  re- 
mainder of  the  water  round  about  the  pipe  is  weighed 

1  The  methods  of  science  will  be  considered  in  Chapters  II-V. 


SCIENTIFIC  KNOWLEDGE  5 

down  by  a  column  of  air  as  high  as  the  sky.  Science, 
it  will  be  seen,  is  exact  knowledge,  whereas  ordinary 
knowledge,  including  much  of  what  is  called  "com- 
mon sense,"  is  inaccurate  and  vague  in  its  outlines 
even  when  sound  at  the  center. 

It  should  be  noted,  however,  that  strictly  speaking, 
the  precision  of  science  obtains  only  in  regard  to  the 
ideal  cases  with  which  pure  science  concerns  itself. 
Its  laws  are  framed  to  state  exactly  how  certain 
objects  will  act  when  free  from  interference  by  out- 
side agencies.  As  a  matter  of  practical  experience, 
however,  no  case  of  entire  freedom  from  interference 
can  be  found.  Science  says  that  water  will  rise  in  a 
pump  thirty-four  feet,  and  no  more;  but  probably 
no  actual  suction  pump  will  raise  it  over  three- 
quarters  of  that  height.  In  geometry  it  is  a  familiar 
fact  that  the  demonstrations  never  hold  entirely 
good  when  applied  to  physical  objects,  because  no 
physical  objects  ever  conform  precisely  to  the  de- 
scriptions on  which  the  theorems  and  problems  are 
based.  We  can  conceive,  for  example,  of  a  perfect 
isosceles  triangle,  but  can  never  find  such  a  thing 
in  nature,  nor  yet  among  the  constructions  of  men; 
hence  all  the  geometric  conclusions  regarding  such 
triangles  are,  and  must  remain,  ideal,  or  theoretical. 
They  state  what  would  be  true  in  the  case  of  a  per- 
fect isosceles  triangle,  and  what  will  be  found  to  be 
true  in  other  isosceles  triangles  in  so  far  as  they 
approach  the  perfect  type.  Substantially  the  same 
thing  is  true  in  physical  science :  The  orbit  of  a  planet 
is  declared  by  the  astronomer  to  be  an  ellipse,  yet 
the  movements  of  no  planet  conform  precisely  to 


6  METHODS 

this  figure,  for  the  reason  that  solar  gravitation  and 
its  own  forward  movement,  though  they  are  the 
major  forces  acting  upon  it,  are  never  the  only  ones. 
Gravitation  toward  other  planets,  varying  in  amount 
as  these  are  near  or  far,  also  enters  into  the  situation, 
so  that  no  statement  based  solely  on  the  mutual 
relations  of  a  planet  and  the  sun  ever  tells  the  whole 
truth.  It  may  be  urged  that  it  never  quite  tells  the 
truth  at  all,  but  is  always  more  or  less  inexact.  This 
criticism  would  be  sound,  if  it  were  the  aim  of  science 
to  describe  actual  situations  in  nature  in  then*  detail 
and  complexity,  but  such  is  not  the  case.  The  aim 
of  science  is  the  universal,  the  thing  which  is  true  in 
all  like  cases  and  despite  differences  of  detail.  To 
find  these  universals  (general  facts  or  truths)  it  is 
obliged  to  abstract  from — that  is,  leave  out  of  con- 
sideration— much  that  is  always  present  in  actual 
cases;  and  it  makes  its  statements  with  these  variable 
details  thus  left  out  of  consideration.  That  is,  its 
statements  (laws,  etc.)  refer  to  essentially  abstract 
or  ideal  cases,  and  they  hold  good  in  actual  cases 
just  in  so  far  as  the  agents  referred  to  in  the  state- 
ments have  the  field  to  themselves.  Hence,  scien- 
tific laws  can  be,  and  are,  precise.  Interfering 
agencies  aside,  the  orbit  of  a  planet  is  always  an 
ellipse,  and  the  precise  eccentricity  of  any  given 
planet's  orbit  can  always  be  ascertained. 

So  of  the  pump:  the  general  truth  which  science 
is  concerned  with — the  height  of  the  water  column 
which  the  air  pressure  will  support,  say  at  the  sea 
level,  water  and  ah-  being  at  certain  known  tempera- 
tures and  the  air  of  a  given  humidity — is  a  perfectly 


SCIENTIFIC  KNOWLEDGE  7 

definite  one,  and  may  be  stated  with  precision;  but 
the  degree  to  which  a  given  pump  will  exemplify 
this  truth  depends  upon  its  success  in  producing  a 
vacuum  in  the  pipe,  and  that,  of  course,  will  vary 
with  the  skill  of  the  pump's  maker  and  the  excellence 
of  his  materials.  It  will  be  seen  that  science  is  exact 
knowledge  only  within  its  chosen  field,  the  field  of  the 
so-called  universal,  or  things  that  are  true  on  a  wide 
scale. 

(2)  Usually  scientific  knowledge  is  also  charac- 
terized by  greater  certainty  than  that  of  common  life. 
It  was  originally  thought  that  there  was  no  limit  to 
the  height  to  which  a  pump  would  lift  water — a  view 
which  we  now  know  to  be  quite  erroneous.  It  was 
once  a  part  of  universal  knowledge,  and  doubtless  is 
so  still  with  the  majority  of  mankind,  that  the  sun 
moves  around  the  earth;  but  for  educated  men  as- 
tronomy has  disproved  that  conception,  and,  in 
spite  of  the  seeming  testimony  of  our  senses  to  the 
contrary,  has  convinced  us  that  the  earth  moves 
around  the  sun.  The  reasons  which  it  gives  for  this 
(Copernican)  view  are  so  cogent  that  we  feel  certain 
as  to  the  facts  in  a  way  that  was  impossible  under 
the  older  views. 

Yet  certainty  is  not  confined  to  science.  Indeed, 
a  scientific  fact  is  not  necessarily  more  certain  than 
other  facts,  though  it  usually  is  so.  On  February  15, 
1898,  the  U.  S.  battleship,  Maine,  was  blown  up  hi 
the  harbor  of  Havana.  This  event  is  undubitable; 
yet  it  is  not  a  scientific  fact.  It  is  a  historical  fact. 
It  is  not  scientific,  because  it  cannot  be  proved  ex- 
perimentally, or,  to  put  the  distinction  in  another 


8  METHODS 

way,  it  cannot  be  repeated.  It  is  true  that  another 
battleship  might  be  moored  to  the  same  buoy  and 
destroyed  in  a  similar  way;  but  this  would  not  prove 
that  the  Maine  was  blown  up  on  February  15,  1898, 
but  only  that  warships  can  be  destroyed  by  explosives 
suitably  placed.  The  latter  would  indeed  be  a  scien- 
tific fact,  but  it  would  tell  us  nothing  as  to  the  fate  of 
the  Maine.  Indeed,  so  far  as  science  as  such  knows, 
the  Maine  and  her  crew  may  still  be  sailing  the 
seas. 

(3)  From  what  has  been  said  in  the  two  sections 
above  it  is  evident  that  a  further  and  more  funda- 
mental distinction  of  a  scientific  fact  is  that  it  is 
universal,3  that  is,  general  in  its  application.  It  is  an 
event  or  phenomenon  which  appears  in  an  indefinite 
number  of  similar  situations,  and  under  similar  con- 
ditions it  can  always  be  repeated.  A  historical  fact, 
on  the  contrary,  cannot  be  repeated,  because  the 
time  and  place  of  its  occurrence  are  essential  parts  of 
the  history.  Thus,  it  is  a  scientific  fact  that  the 
Bahama  Islands  lie  between  parallels  20  and  27, 
north  latitude;  for  any  competent  geographer  can 
reproduce  this  result  for  himself  by  computing  from 
natural  phenomena  which  either  remain  constant  or 
are  repeated  at  regular  intervals.  The  historical 
fact,  however,  that  one  of  these  islands  was  the  first 
land  hi  the  western  world  to  be  discovered  by  Colum- 
bus is  a  fact  that  in  the  nature  of  the  case  could 
happen  but  once.  We  shall  have  to  return  later  to 

'Cf.  Aristotle's  remark,  "No  art  treats  of  particular  cases;  for 
particulars  are  infinite,  and  cannot  be  known."  Quoted  by  Jevons, 
"Prina.  of  Science,"  p.  595. 


SCIENTIFIC  KNOWLEDGE  9 

this  important  distinction  that  science  is  general, 
rather  than  particular,  or  unique,  knowledge. 

(4)  Finally,  science  is  not  miscellaneous  knowl- 
edge, but  organized  knowledge.  The  rising  of  water 
in  a  pump  has  not  become  a  completely  scientific 
fact  until  it  has  been  connected  in  thought  with 
others  facts,  some  of  which  precede  it  while  others 
may  coexist  with  it.  On  the  side  of  the  antecedent 
facts,  or  causes,  the  science  of  hydraulics  recognizes 
that  there  are  certain  necessary  conditions:  A 
vacuum,  for  example,  must  be  created  in  the  tube; 
there  must  be  no  access  to  it  on  the  part  of  the  outer 
ah-  otherwise  than  through  the  body  of  water  which 
covers  the  open  end  of  the  tube;  and  this  water  must 
be  exposed  to  the  pressure  of  the  outer  ah*.  Thus,  in 
a  measure  the  phenomenon  of  the  rising  of  the  water 
is  explained  by  being  connected  as  a  consequent 
(that  is,  causally)  with  other  phenomena  more  or 
less  familiar.  This  explanation  is  then  carried 
further  by  connecting  the  phenomenon  with  such 
more  or  less  similar  but  not  antecedent  ones  as  the 
working  of  a  lever  of  the  first  kind,  and  even  the 
action  of  a  pulley.  So  in  both  directions — as  to 
causal  interdependence  and  as  to  pertinent  similari- 
ties— a  scientific  knowledge  of  the  suction  process 
is  an  organized  result;  it  consists  in  interlocking  that 
process  with  other  known  phenomena,  and  recog- 
nizing how  it  is  interrelated  with  the  general  system 
of  nature.  This  dual  relational  movement  is  char- 
acteristic of  scientific  thought.  It  seeks  always  to 
organize  its  material,  to  arrange  phenomena  in  such 
a  way  as  to  reveal  their  causal  articulation  and  their 


10  METHODS 

more  important  resemblances.  Scientific  knowledge 
is  a  fabric  woven  by  thought,  of  which  relations  of 
causation  constitute  the  warp  and  relations  of  sim- 
ilarity the  woof. 

Science  and  Philosophy. — As  just  intimated,  and 
as  the  student  of  logic  is  aware,  scientific  explanation 
consists  in  establishing  relations — of  sequence,  sim- 
ilarity, inclusion,  etc. — between  the  object  under 
inquiry  and  some  fact  or  law  which  is  more  familiar. 
It  is  a  common  notion  that  explanation  is  the  answer- 
ing of  all  questions  to  which  a  phenomenon  can  give 
rise,  so  that  it  is  made  entirely  plain,  or  completely 
rational,  to  the  mind;  but  this  is  far  from  being  the 
case.  Many  questions  of  interest  always  remain. 
For  most  purposes  it  is  no  doubt  a  very  satisfactory 
explanation  that  the  34  foot  column  of  water  in  the 
pump  is  held  in  position  by  the  counterpoise  of  a  50 
(or  more)  mile  column  of  air;  but  why  do  air  and 
water  have  weight  at  all;  that  is,  why  do  they  press 
so  persistently  towards  the  center  of  the  earth?  How 
is  it  that  the  water  in  the  cistern  transmits  the  air 
pressure  so  freely  to  the  water  in  the  tube,  which  is 
not  in  contact  with  the  air?  In  other  words,  what  is 
the  secret  of  the  mobility  of  the  fluid  molecules?  The 
molecules  of  alumina  in  the  bricks  and  of  iron  or 
glass  in  the  tube  do  not  act  in  this  fluent,  all  but 
f rictionless  way.  And  why  are  the  molecules  of  water, 
with  all  their  fluidity,  on  terms  of  seeming  amity, 
while  those  of  the  ah*  are  on  terms  of  aversion  and  in 
continual  conflict?  Indeed,  how  is  it  that  a  molecule 
or  an  atom  ever  does  anything  at  all,  either  in  the 
way  of  a  change  of  place  or  of  union  with  another 


SCIENTIFIC   KNOWLEDGE  11 

infinitesimal  individual,  an  individual  full  often 
quite  unlike  itself?  These,  and  others  that  might  be 
mentioned,  are  questions  of  interest  springing  out  of 
this  one  phenomenon  of  the  pump  to  which  there  is 
as  yet  no  trustworthy  answer,  and  concerning  which 
we  can  only  speculate.  Indeed,  the  world  is  full  of 
mysterious  phenomena,  partial  disclosures  and  vague 
suggestions,  which  challenge  our  inquiry,  but  as  to 
which  though  we  may  form,  we  cannot  verify,  our 
hypotheses.  They  are  found  along  all  the  border- 
land of  the  sciences.  What  shall  we  do  with  them? 
Most  men,  of  course,  ignore  them.  Few  inquirers  in 
the  fields  where  they  present  themselves,  however, 
are  willing  to  do  that.  They  seem  to  be  doors  which 
science  may  one  day  unlock; 4  yet  no  explanations  of 
them  at  present  can  be  called  scientific,  because  no 
explanations  can  be  proved.  The  hypotheses  to 
which  they  give  rise  are  properly  philosophical  doc- 
trines, such  of  these  as  are  concerned  with  ultimate 
explanations  in  physics  being  best  termed  meta- 
physics; and  the  challenging  but  elusive  facts  them- 
selves are  most  usefully  to  be  described  as  the  subject- 
matter,  or  field,  of  philosophy. 

This  view  is  not  the  only  one,  however,  nor  indeed 
the  usual  one.  It  is  more  common  to  claim  for  philos- 
ophy standing  as  a  science,  to  call  it,  in  fact,  the 
science  of  sciences.  Such  a  claim  disregards  philos- 
ophy's lack  of  power  to  verify  its  conclusions,  and 
holds  that  it  differs  from  other  sciences  only  in  having 

4 Of.  the  remark  of  Prof.  J.  J.  Thompson:  "The  progress  of  elec- 
trical science  has  been  greatly  promoted  by  speculations  as  to  the 
nature  of  electricity." — "Elec.  and  Matter,"  p.  1. 


12  METHODS 

as  its  subject-matter,  not  the  phenomena  of  any 
one  field  of  inquiry,  but  those  which  are  common  to 
all  fields,  or  at  least  involve  more  fields  than  one. 
Thus  energy  as  momentum  belongs  to  the  science  of 
physics;  as  combining  activity  it  belongs  to  the 
science  of  chemistry;  as  psychic  force  to  the  sciences 
of  biology  and  psychology;  while  energy  in  general, 
its  nature  and  significance,  belongs  to  the  science 
of  philosophy.5 

The  former  conception  is  the  one  adopted  in  this 
book,  the  author  believing  that  it  will  conduce  most 
to  a  clear  presentation  and  a  ready  grasp  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  science.  According  to  it  the  field  of  philosophy 
is  regarded  as  the  penumbra,  not  the  strongly  lighted 
part,  of  the  domain  of  inquiry;  and  philosophic 
thought  itself  as  the  adventurous,  speculating  ac- 
tivity of  the  mind,  the  scout  of  science  ranging  the 
borderland  of  knowledge.  This  does  not  mean  that 
philosophy  is  unscientific.  Rather  does  it  mean  the 
contrary,  that  sound  philosophy  has  the  same  ends 
and  standards,6  and  in  large  degree  the  same  methods, 
as  science.  Yet  it  does  mean  that,  since  experi- 

•  Cf.  Paulsen,  "Introd.  to  Philosophy,"  p.  19  f. 

•  It  is  the  proper  scandal  of  philosophy  that  so  many  of  its  rep- 
resentatives have  written  as  though  the  canons  and  logical  tests  of 
science  were  not  for  them,  but  they  were  free,  by  virtue  of  the 
mystery  shrouding  their  subject-matter,  to  reach  whatever  con- 
clusions pleased  their  fancy.     The  natural  consequence  has  been, 
of  course,  that  whenever  their  conclusions  did  not  please  the  fancy 
of  their  readers,  these  conclusions  were  rejected  even  more  lightly 
than  they  were  produced.    A  philosophy  that  is  worthy  of  the  name 
is  scientific  hi  spirit,  and,  so  far  as  the  subject-matter  allows, 
scientific  also  in  method,  while  scientific  results  are  the  ideals  which 
it  holds  before  itself. 


MOTIVES  13 

mental  verification  is  not  open  to  philosophy,  it 
cannot  go  so  far  as  science  in  the  way  of  knowledge; 
it  cannot  attain  to  certainty.  As  a  consequence, 
serious  differences  of  philosophic  opinion  are  not 
only  possible  but,  in  view  of  the  differences  in  human 
minds,  inevitable.  This  is  the  reason  why  the  domain 
of  philosophy  bristles  with  the  crags  of  disputed 
questions  as  that  of  science  does  not.  In  the  latter 
verification  soon  clears  the  field  of  all  conclusions 
but  one.  The  cases  in  which  this  is  not  so  are  cases 
where  the  question  at  issue  is  still  in  the  philosophic 
borderland,  and  not  really  within  the  domain  of 
science  proper.  The  distinction,  though  clear,  is, 
of  course,  not  a  fence.  Philosophers  continually  go 
to  science  for  their  material,  as  they  should;  and 
scientists  continually  pass  beyond  experimental 
facts  and  necessary  implications  to  speculations  and 
theories,  as  is  their  privilege. 

Motives  of  Scientific  Inquiry. — We  have  seen  that 
even  in  antiquity  it  was  known  that  water  could  be 
raised  by  means  of  a  suction  pump.  Why  was  it 
that  men  like  Galileo  7  early  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury were  not  content  with  this  traditional  fact,  but 
sought  to  convert  it  into  scientific  knowledge?  In 
a  general  way,  it  may  be  answered  that  the  fact  was 
essentially  mysterious — water  when  free  to  move 
does  not  usually  move  upward,  but  downward — 
and  mystery  is  full  of  challenge  to  inquiry.  There 

Galileo,  or  Galilei  (1564-1642),  was  a  famous  Italian  physicist, 
astronomer,  and  inventor.  He  invented  the  thermometer  and  the 
telescope,  and  made  many  important  discoveries.  His  teachings 
were  condemned  by  the  pope,  and  the  inquisition  forced  him  to  abjure 
the  Copernican  theory,  of  which  he  was  an  ardent  advocate. 


14  METHODS 

was  a  material  difference,  however,  in  the  degree  to 
which  the  mystery  of  the  water's  rise  taxed  observing 
minds.  Some  were  easily  satisfied.  "Nature," 
ran  the  sufficient  dictum  of  the  scholastic  teachers, 
"abhors  a  vacuum."  Now,  as  a  metaphorical  de- 
scription of  a  striking  group  of  phenomena,  this 
statement  is  true  and  useful;8  but  it  is  not  an  ex- 
planation— not,  at  least,  until  it  is  shown  that  nature 
is  a  sentient  and  emotional  being,  capable  of  acting 
upon  such  a  motive  as  abhorrence. 

Galileo  and  his  fellows  demanded  a  more  definite, 
sure,  and  adequate  explanation;  and  this  Torricelli9 
at  length  secured  by  connecting  the  fact  that  the 
air  has  weight  with  the  fact  that  the  water  will  not 
rise  more  than  thirty-four  feet,  and  the  further  fact, 
ascertained  by  experiment,  that  mercury  under  like 
conditions  rises  but  thirty  inches.  That  is,  water, 
which  is  13.6  times  lighter  than  mercury,  will  rise 
13.6  times  higher.  Evidently  the  cause  of  the  rise 
of  each  was  some  factor  which  was  affected  by  their 
different  weights.  That  common  factor  could  only 
be  the  pressure  of  the  external  air  upon  the  exposed 
surfaces  of  the  two  liquids.  It  is  an  interesting  fact, 
as  bearing  upon  the  motives  of  the  man  of  science, 

•  Whewell  ("Hist,  of  the  Indue.  Sciences,"  I,  p.  347)  pronounced 
the  principle  of  "Nature's  horror  of  a  vacuum"  "a  very  good  one, 
inasmuch  as  it  brought  together  all  these  [mentioned]  facts  which 
are  really  of  the  same  kind,  and  referred  them  to  a  common  cause;" 
but  he  added  that,  "when  urged  as  an  ultimate  principle,"  it  was 
unphilosophical,  "because  it  introduced  the  notion  of  an  emotion, 
Horror,  as  an  account  of  physical  facts." 

»  Torricelli  (1608-1647),  another  celebrated  Italian  physicist,  was 
the  pupil,  friend,  and  successor  of  Galileo. 


MOTIVES  15 

that  Torricelli  was  greatly  impressed  by  the  simplic- 
ity and  beauty  of  his  discovery,  and  lamented  that 
his  master,  Galileo,  did  not  live  to  make  it  himself. 
Similar  pleasurable  emotions  were  aroused  a  little 
later  when  Pascal 10  succeeded  in  confirming  Torri- 
celli's  conclusion.  Pascal  wrote  to  his  brother-in-law, 
M.  Perrier,  who  lived  near  the  Puy  de  Dome  in 
Auvergne,  asking  him  to  take  a  Torricellian  tube  to 
the  top  of  the  mountain,  and  ascertain  the  height 
at  which  the  mercury  stood  there.  "If,"  he  added, 
"it  happens  that  the  height  of  the  mercury  at  the 
top  of  the  hill  be  less  than  at  the  bottom,  it  will  follow 
that  the  weight  and  pressure  of  the  air  are  the 
sole  cause  of  this  suspension,  and  not  the  horror 
of  a  vacuum:  since  it  is  very  certain  that  there  is 
more  air  to  weigh  on  it  at  the  bottom  than  at  the 
top;  while  we  cannot  say  that  nature  abhors  a  vacuum 
at  the  foot  of  a  mountain  more  than  on  its  summit."11 
The  experiment  was  duly  made,  and  the  mercury  on 
the  mountain  top  found  to  stand  three  inches  lower 
than  at  the  base — a  result  which,  M.  Perrier  said, 
"ravished  us  with  admiration  and  astonishment." 
The  pleasure  which  these  men  evince  over  their 
discoveries  goes  far  to  answer  the  question  why  they 
responded  so  eagerly  and  earnestly  to  nature's 
mysteries;  that  is,  why  they  sought  to  make  knowl- 
edge scientific.  They  admired  nature  and  her  ways, 


10  Pascal,  Blaise  (1623-1662),  waa  an  eminent  French  mathemati- 
cian and  philosopher.    He  became  noted  at  the  age  of  17  through  his 
"Treatise  on  Conic  Sections."    Later  in  life  he  became  a  clergyman 
and  an  ardent  upholder  of  the  Jansenist  cause  against  the  Jesuits. 

11  Whewell,  o.  c.,  I,  p.  348. 


16  METHODS 

and  found  pleasure  in  studying  them;  or,  to  state 
the  fact  in  other  words,  they  had  a  love  of  knowledge 
for  its  own  sake.  This,  which  may  be  called  the 
contemplative  motive  of  science,  is  one  that  has 
characterized  numberless  investigators12  of  nature 
from  Aristarchus13  to  Darwin.14  The  philosopher 
Spinoza  15  accounted  it  the  highest  of  all  possible 
motives  and  the  gratification  of  it — the  absorbed 
contemplation  of  the  workings  of  nature,  regarded  as 
a  causal  mechanism — was  dignified  by  him  with  the 
term  "the  intellectual  love  of  God."  From  its  point 
of  view  the  world  is  a  panorama,  or  better  a  drama, 
and  the  man  of  science  is  the  privileged  spectator 
who,  by  dint  of  mental  toil,  has  earned  the  right  of 
admission  and  admiring  observation. 

The  contemplative  is  not  the  only  motive  of  inquiry, 
however,  and  never  has  been.  The  earliest  study 
of  the  stars,  for  example,  was  not  so  much  to  under- 
stand the  order  and  movements  of  the  shining  spec- 
tacle for  its  own  sake,  as  for  the  purpose  of  reading 

12  For  example,  the  late  John  William  Draper  once  remarked  that 
many  a  night,  when  absorbed  in  original  research  in  the  laboratory, 
he  had  been  surprised  by  the  incoming  of  the  morning  light. 

11  Aristarchus  was  a  noted  Greek  astronomer  of  the  Alexandrian 
school  who  lived  in  the  first  half  of  the  third  century,  B.  C.  He 
held  that  the  earth  moves  around  the  sun  in  a  circular  course. 

14  Darwin,  Charles  (1809-1882)  was  a  celebrated  English  natural- 
ist, and  one  of  the  greatest  of  scientific  investigators.  He  is  noted 
especially  as  the  chief  author  of  the  theory  of  natural  selection,  now 
BO  generally  accepted. 

"  Spinoza,  Baruch  or  Benedict  (1632-1677),  was  a  great  phil- 
osopher who  is  best  known  as  the  most  notable  modern  expounder  of 
pantheism.  He  was  a  Dutch  Jew  by  birth,  but,  though  his  life  was 
blameless,  he  was  cast  out  from  the  synagogue  because  of  his  phil- 
osophical views. 


MOTIVES  17 

the  will  of  the  gods  as  to  the  coming  fortunes  of  men 
and  nations.  It  was  astrology  rather  than  astron- 
omy, and  its  motive  was  practical,  not  contemplative; 
that  is,  the  student  hoped  to  get  some  benefit  from 
what  he  learned  beyond  the  knowledge  itself.  Much 
the  same  may  be  said  as  to  the  first  students  of 
chemical  reactions.  The  wizard  antedated  the  chem- 
ist, and  his  motive  was  practical  benefit  in  the  way 
of  cure  of  disease,  exorcism  of  demons,  or  the  control 
of  others  through  secret  charms. 

Prior  to  modern  tunes  this  practical  motive  hardly 
deserved  to  be  considered  scientific,  for  it  was  com- 
monly dominated  by  faith  in  the  occult — that  vague, 
half  blind,  timorous  belief  which  we  call  superstition — 
and  remained  largely  unenlightened.  Yet  there  was 
nothing  that  required  this  alliance;  and,  after  the 
renaissance,  under  the  impulse  of  the  humanistic 
movement,  men  of  genuine  scientific  spirit  arose  who 
sought  to  join  the  practical  interest  to  the  contem- 
plative. Prominent  among  these  were  Francis  Ba- 
con 16  and  Descartes.17  For  them  nature  was  not 
simply  a  wonderful  spectacle  to  be  enjoyed;  it  was  a 
stupendous  mechanism  to  be  mastered  and  used  for 
human  benefit.  "Knowledge  is  power,"  was  Bacon's 

16  Bacon,  Francis,  afterward  Lord  Verulam  (1561-1626)  was  an 
English  jurist,  statesman  and  philosopher  of  great  ability.    Though 
not  a  man  of  science,  he  championed  enthusiastically  the  cause  of 
the  new  science  of  his  time.    In  so  doing,  he  exalted  the  inductive 
method  of  inquiry  at  the  expense  of  the  deductive. 

17  Descartes,  Rene"  (1596-1650),  an  eminent  French  mathemati- 
cian, physiologist,  and  philosopher,  is  often  called  the  "father  of 
modern  philosophy."     Prof.  Huxley  (Cf.  "Method  and  Results," 
Es.  4)  accojinf-ed  him  of  J&e  primary  importance  in  the  field  of 
physiology. 


18  METHODS 

great  formula;  that  is,  an  adequate  knowledge  of 
nature  would  reveal  to  man  the  reins  of  control  of 
natural  forces  and  enable  him  to  become  their  ruler. 
Descartes  held  it  "possible  to  arrive  at  knowledge 
highly  useful  in  life,"  and  by  means  of  scientific 
acquaintance  with  natural  forces  to  apply  them  "to 
all  the  uses  to  which  they  are  adapted,  and  thus 
render  ourselves  the  lords  and  possessors  of  nature."18 
In  our  own  tune  the  practical  motive  has  abun- 
dantly vindicated  itself,  not  only  in  applied  but  also 
in  pure  science.  Investigators  like  Koch  19  and 
Pasteur  M  who  devote  years  of  labor  to  the  discovery 
or  invention  of  a  serum  which  will  control  a  deadly 
disease  are  not  regarded  as  coming  short  in  any  re- 
spect in  true  scientific  spirit.  Nor  does  there  appear 
to  be  any  reason  why  the  practical  motive  should 
not  play  a  major  part  in  research.  Certainly  it  has 
been  the  practical  side  of  science,  its  services  to 
human  needs,  that  in  modern  times  has  given  it 
its  hold  upon  popular  confidence  and  banished  the 
medieval  fear  of  it  as  a  kind  of  magic.  Then,  scien- 
tific inquiries  are,  of  course,  pursued  for  some  end; 
and  it  does  not  appear  why  the  promoting  of  human 
health,  and  the  release  of  human  energies  through 
useful  inventions  and  the  control  of  natural  forces 
from  the  bondage  of  toil  for  mere  self  sustenance, 

18  "Discourse  on  Method,"  Pt.  VI. 

19  Koch,  Robert  (1843-        ),  a  celebrated  German  physician,  is 
the  discoverer  of  the  bacilli  of  tuberculosis  and  cholera.    In  1905 
he  received  the  Nobel  prize  in  medicine. 

20  Pasteur,  Louis  (1822-1895),  a  great  French  chemist  and  micros- 
copist,  is  famous  especially  for  his  researches  in  bacteria,  fermenta- 
tion, and  hydrophobia. 


MOTIVES  19 

are  not  as  worthy  ends  for  scientific  endeavor  as  the 
disclosure  to  intellectual  contemplation  of  nature's 
agencies  and  mechanisms. 

No  doubt  it  may  go  astray.  It  may  take  on  a 
sordid  character,  a  greed  for  commercial  results, 
that  is  in  strong  contrast  with  the  noble  disinterest- 
edness which  scientific  inquirers  have  usually  dis- 
played. A  more  serious  danger  is  that  of  narrowness 
of  vision  through  haste  for  a  serviceable  outcome; 
a  neglect,  for  example,  of  exceptional  and  residual 
phenomena.  It  is  especially  at  this  point  that  it 
needs  to  be  supplemented  by  the  contemplative 
interest.  To  approach  nature  with  more  of  craving 
for  her  material  gifts  than  of  interest  in  herself 
is  not  the  way  to  penetrate  her  mysteries,  as  in  time 
alchemism  discovered. 

There  is  a  wider  sense  of  the  word  "practical" 
emphasis  upon  which  is  not  seriously  beset  with  the 
dangers  just  mentioned.  It  is  the  sense  of  instru- 
mental, or  serviceable  to  a  valuable  end  of  some  kind, 
including  the  end  of  acquisition  of  further  knowledge. 
Thus  it  was  a  practical,  or  "pragmatic,"  motive 
which  led  Newton  21  to  labor  so  patiently  to  deter- 
mine the  precise  departure  of  the  moon's  orbit  from  a 
tangential  course.  The  satisfaction  in  view  in  that 
case  was  not  primarily  the  intellectual  pleasure  of 
knowing  the  precise  curve  itself,  but  that  of  testing 
his  hypothesis  of  universal  gravitation.  The  result 

u  Newton,  Sir  Isaac  (1642-1727),  was  an  eminent  English  math- 
ematician and  physicist.  He  is  most  famous  for  his  formulation  of 
the  law  of  gravitation;  but  he  was  also  a  distinguished  investigator 
in  physics,  notably  in  optics. 


20  METHODS 

when  achieved  would  serve  a  valuable  end  of  knowl- 
edge beyond  itself.  Indeed,  the  moment  we  take  the 
word  practical  in  this  way,  we  see  that  the  bulk  of  the 
patient  toil  so  characteristic  of  modern  science  is 
undergone  through  practical  motives.  Only  the 
larger  discoveries,  if  any,  are  interesting  enough  to 
reward  the  investigator  through  their  own  inherent, 
or  esthetic,  value;  most  new  facts  are  prized  because 
of  the  larger  results  to  which  they  may  lead. 

It  should  be  noted  also  that  even  the  path  of  the 
contemplative  interest  is  not  free  from  pitfalls. 
Under  its  sole  control  the  investigator  is  prone  to  be 
swayed  by  private  liking.  He  who  inquires  into  nature 
purely  for  the  pleasure  of  becoming  acquainted  with 
her  more  intimate  forms  is  especially  likely  to  inter- 
pret what  he  sees  in  ways  pleasing  to  himself.  It  is 
along  the  line  of  this  tendency  that  philosophy  and 
theology  have  so  often  led  science  into  the  ditch. 
Thus,  Aristotle  accounted  for  the  fact  that  a  weight 
on  the  long  arm  of  a  lever  will  move  a  greater  one  on 
the  short  arm  by  saying  that  the  former  moved 
in  a  larger  circle,  and  that  the  circle  was  essentially 
wonderful,  because  it  combined  the  opposites  of  a 
stationary  point  and  a  moving  line.  The  line,  too, 
was  both  convex  and  concave.22  From  analogous 
esthetic  reasons  the  church  denied  the  existence  of 
more  planets  than  five.  These  with  the  sun  and  moon 
made  seven,  which  was  a  perfect  number;  and  what 
but  perfection  was  to  be  expected  in  the  heavens?  23 

Furthermore,   the   contemplative   motive   seems 

«  Quoted  by  Whewell,  o.  c.,  I,  p.  84  f . 

"Cf.  Jevons,  "Principles  of  Science,"  p.  623  ff. 


MOTIVES  21 

generally  to  have  induced  a  philosophic  attitude 
which  is  open  to  serious  question — the  disposition 
to  assume  the  fundamental,  or  underlying,  change- 
lessness  of  the  world.  The  thought  of  witnessing  a 
spectacle  is  apt  to  suggest,  though  it  does  not  necessi- 
tate, the  idea  that  somewhere  back  of  the  shifting 
scenes  there  is  an  agent  or  machine  or  framework 
which  remains  always  the  same,  maintaining  the 
spectacle  by  doing  the  same  thing  over  and  over. 
Indeed,  in  one  of  the  earliest  and  most  influential 
of  the  Greek  schools  of  thought — the  Eleatic — the 
very  existence  of  change  was  denied,  and  the  seem- 
ingly endless  mutation  of  nature  was  declared  to  be 
illusion. 

In  these  respects  the  contemplative  interest  has 
found  a  valuable  corrective  in  the  practical.  The 
concern  of  the  latter  being  with  what  will  render 
service,  either  material  or  intellectual,  it  is  freed  on 
the  one  hand  from  the  tendency  to  favor  certain 
pleasing  types  of  explanation,  while  on  the  other 
it  is  under  continual  incitement  to  put  its  theoretical 
constructions  to  the  test  of  experiment.  Its  motto 
naturally  is,  whatever  will  work,  and  work  best,  is  to 
be  approved.  Both  motives  are  needed  for  sound 
scientific  advance,  though  in  individual  investigators 
one  may  properly  enough  predominate  over  the  other 
according  to  natural  bent  of  mind. 

EXERCISES 

1.  Point  out  the  four  characteristic  marks  of  scientific  as  dis- 
tinguished from  ordinary  knowledge  hi  the  cases  of 

A.  The  nature  of  the  sun  and  its  relation  to  the  earth; 

B.  The  nature  of  light  and  the  process  of  vision. 


22  METHODS 

2.  Give  three  instances  of  collision  between  ordinary  ideas 
and  truth  as  scientifically  established,  showing  in  each  case  why 
the  scientific  account  of  the  matter  should  be  accepted. 

3.  When  Cavendish  (about  1784)  discovered  that  water  could 
be  decomposed,  and  the  resulting  hydrogen  burned  in  the  air 
with  water  as  the  result,  show  why  the  discovery  itself  was  a 
historical  fact  while  the  composite  nature  of  the  water  was  a 
scientific  fact. 

4.  A.  Show  when  psychology  and  sociology  may  be  considered 
to  be  genuine  sciences,  and  when  they  are  to  be  regarded  as 
branches  of  philosophy. 

B.  What  change  or  further  development  in  ethics  and 
theology  would  be  necessary  before  they  also  could  be  recog- 
nized as  sciences  in  the  strict  sense? 

5.  A.  Make  a  careful  abstract  of  J.  A.  Thomson's  "Intro- 
duction to  Science,"  chapter  I. 

B.  Do  the  same  with  his  fifth  chapter. 

6.  In  the  following  extracts  and  cited  passages  tell  which 
scientific  motive  predominates  in  each,  and  give  reasons  for  your 
opinion.     If  both  motives  are  present,  show  how  they  reveal 
themselves. 

(1)  "Believe   it,    my   good    friend,  to   love   truth   for 
truth's  sake  is  the  principal  part  of  human  perfection  in 
this  world,  and  the  seed  plot  of  all  other  virtues." — John 
Locke. 

(2)  "If  God  should  hold  absolute  truth  in  his  right  hand, 
and  everlasting  search  for  truth  in  the  other  (though  without 
hope  of  ever  reaching  it),  and  should  say  to  me,  'Choose!' 
gladly  would  I  kneel  down  before  him,  and  say,  'Heavenly 
Father,  give  the  everlasting  search.'    Truth  will  make  me 
lazy,  vain,  and  unproductive;  search  for  truth  alone  can 
make  me  happy."— Lessing. 

(3)  Locke's  "Essay  concerning  Human  Understanding," 
prefatory  "Epistle  to  the  Reader." 

(4)  Young's  "General  Astronomy,"  introduction. 

(5)  Darwin,  "Origin  of  Species,"  Conclusion. 

(6)  Huxley,  "Introduction  to  the  Study  of  Zoology", 
pp.  1-3. 


MOTIVES  23 

(7)  Kropotkin,     "Modern    Science    and    Anarchism," 
conclusion. 

7.  Make  an  abstract  of  Karl  Pearson's  "Grammar  of  Science", 
Introd.  sees.  2-4,  9,  and  10,  and  show  which  scientific  motive  he 
emphasizes. 

8.  Make  a  careful  synopsis  of  Paulsen's  reasons  for  calling 
philosophy  "the  sum-total  of  all  scientific  knowledge."  (" Introd. 
to  Philos."  pp.  15-44). 


CHAPTER  II 

PRINCIPLES— THE  TWO  FUNDAMENTAL 
METHODS 

Principles  of  Science  are  Established  Ideas  of 
General  Application. — If  science  is  exact,  certain, 
universal,  and  organized  knowledge,  what  is  a  "prin- 
ciple of  science"?  The  term  has  a  somewhat  loose 
application,  standing,  as  it  does,  for  three  distinct 
kinds  of  ideas.  It  can  at  least  be  affirmed,  however,  at 
the  outset  that  a ' '  principle"  is  always  an  idea.  It  is  a 
product  of  thought,  not  an  object  of  sense  percep- 
tion. It  is  a  truth,  not  a  fact  in  the  narrow  sense, 
that  is,  not  a  phenomenon. 

When  Franklin  l  flew  his  kite  in  the  thunder-storm, 
he  did  elicit  a  new  phenomenon:  electric  sparks 
sprang  from  the  charged  cord.  This  evidently  was  a 
fact,  a  concrete  matter  of  observation  by  the  senses. 
But  when  he  drew  the  general  conclusion  that  the 
lightning  itself  is  but  a  huge  electric  spark,  a  tremen- 
dous manifestation  of  static  electricity,  he  was  assert- 
ing a  truth  rather  than  a  fact.  His  conclusion  was 
reached  by  a  process  of  thought,  not  by  sense  percep- 

1  Franklin,  Benj.  (1706-1790),  a  great  American  statesman, 
philosopher,  and  author,  is  best  known  as  the  able  and  faithful  up- 
holder of  the  cause  of  the  American  colonies  in  their  revolt  against 
Great  Britain;  but  his  vigorous  mind  was  greatly  interested  also  in 
natural  inquiry. 

24 


PRINCIPLES  25 

tion  alone,  though  of  course  the  objects  of  sense — 
sparks,  lightning  flashes,  etc. — were  used  by  thought. 
Furthermore,  it  was  general  in  its  application.  He 
affirmed,  not  merely  that  those  particular  sparks 
given  off  by  the  cord  were  electrical,  but  (by  the  so- 
called  inductive  leap  of  thought)  that  all  lightning 
flashes  are  electric  sparks. 

(1)  In  reaching  that  general  conclusion,   which 
has  held  good  since,  Franklin  established  a  scientific 
principle;  for  one  meaning  of  the  term,  principle  of 
science  is,  Any  result  of  scientific  inquiry  which  is 
general  in  its  application,  and  in  the  discovery  of  which 
reflective  thought  plays  a  leading  part.    Such  scientific 
principles  may  be  called  Empirical  Principles,  since 
they  are  the  results  of  experience  worked  over  in  the 
mind',  or  they  may  be  called  Material  Principles,2 
seeing  that  they  constitute  an  important  part  of  the 
material  with  which  science  works. 

(2)  Franklin's  discovery,  however,  illustrates  an- 
other kind  of  scientific  principle,  for  it  involved  cer- 
tain methods  of  thought  that  are  clistinctive  of  science, 
and  these,  when  generally  approved,  are  also  called 
principles.    How  did  it  occur  to  him  that  the  Leyden 
jar  and  its  spark  might  hold  the  secret  of  the  thunder- 
storm?    The  two  phenomena  have  striking  differ- 
ences.   The  jar  is  small,  hard,  motionless  (apart  from 
the  occasional  spark),  and  still,  except  for  the  snap- 
ping sound  at  the  moment  of  discharge.    The  storm- 
clouds,  on  the  contrary,  are  vast,  ill-defined,  surging 
with  tumultuous  movement,  and  charged  with  awe- 

1  And  so  distinguished  from  the  formal  principles  of  logic  and 
scientific  method. 


26  METHODS 

inspiring  rumblings  which  break  every  now  and  then 
into  astounding  crashes.  Why  connect  the  two?  It 
is  evident  that  no  one  would  do  so  who  surveyed  them 
as  wholes.  Only  after  the  observer  had  in  thought 
separated  the  jar  and  the  storm  phenomena  into 
their  component  parts,  that  is,  analyzed  each,  and 
had  dropped  out  of  consideration  for  the  moment 
the  many  features  in  which  they  differ — only  then 
would  it  have  occurred  to  him  that  the  lightning  was 
after  all  but  a  huge  electric  spark.  The  two  flashes, 
or  sparks,  are  indeed  much  alike  except  as  to  size, 
but  this  likeness  discloses  itself  only  when  they  are 
thought  of  apart  from  their  exceedingly  diverse  accom- 
paniments. Now,  the  process  of  dividing  an  object 
into  parts,  either  physically  or  mentally,  in  accord- 
ance with  the  lines  of  its  structure,  is  called  analysis; 
and  it  is  a  cardinal  principle  of  science,  though  a 
Methodological  (or  formal)  and  not  an  Empirical  one. 
So  important  is  it  that  it  is  not  too  much  to  call  it 
the  vestibule  of  the  temple  of  science. 

Another  methodological  principle  plays  an  equally 
important  part  in  Franklin's  discovery;  for  he  evi- 
dently put  some  things  together  as  well  as  took  others 
apart.  The  spark  which  he  drew  from  the  kite  cord 
did  not  of  itself  tell  him  that  it  was  electrical,  nor 
yet  that  it  had  come  from  the  storm-cloud.  It  sim- 
ply acted  according  to  its  nature,  and  that  way  of 
acting,  being  much  like  the  phenomena  of  the  Leyden 
jar,  Franklin's  thought  connected  with  the  familiar, 
that  is,  electrical,  sparks  of  the  latter.  Moreover, 
as  there  appeared  to  be  no  other  possible  origin  for 
it  than  the  cloud  out  of  which  the  lightning  sprang, 


PRINCIPLES  27 

his  thought  traced  it  back  to  that  same  source.  Indeed, 
it  did  more;  for  it  conceived  of  the  storm-cloud  as 
containing  stores  of  static  electricity  in  essentially 
the  same  way  as  a  Leyden  jar  contains  them.  This 
is  evidently  a  movement  of  thought  in  the  opposite 
direction  from  that  of  analysis.  It  puts  things  to- 
gether instead  of  taking  them  apart.  It  is  a  con- 
structive, phenomenon-joining  process.  It  is  mental, 
or  logical,  synthesis;  and  synthesis,  quite  as  much  as 
analysis,  is  a  cardinal  principle  of  science.  Indeed, 
these  two,  analysis  and  synthesis,  together  with  cer- 
tain regulative  principles  for  safeguarding  synthetic 
thought  processes,  may  be  said  to  constitute  the 
methodological,  or  formal,  principles  of  science. 
Scientific  method,  so  far  as  it  is  a  matter  of  thought, 
and  not  of  technical  manipulation,  is  essentially  a 
critical  distinguishing,  or  mental  separation  of  phe- 
nomena into  their  fundamental  elements  or  fac- 
tors, and  then  a  recombination  of  these  in  thought 
according  to  pertinent  relations  of  resemblance  and 
sequence,  as  outlined  in  the  last  chapter. 

(3)  There  is  still  a  third  kind  of  scientific  principle 
involved  in  Franklin's  thunder-storm  experiment. 
He  assumed  something  in  drawing  his  conclusion; 
indeed,  he  assumed  it  in  flying  his  kite  at  all,  and  he 
had  to  assume  it.  The  assumption  was  that  what  he 
found  to  be  true  that  day  would  be  true,  under  like 
conditions,  on  all  days.  Without  this  general  prin- 
ciple, commonly  known  as  the  uniformity  of  nature, 
his  conclusion  that  the  lightning  is  (on  all  occasions) 
an  electric  spark  would  have  been  no  scientific  princi- 
ple at  all,  for  it  would  have  lacked  generality  of 


28  METHODS 

application.  Yet,  as  will  appear  in  the  third  part  of 
our  stud}',  this  principle  is  not  an  empirical  one,  for 
it  is  not  proved  by  experience — though  it  is  confirmed 
— nor  is  it  provable  by  experience.  Neither  is  it  a 
methodological  principle,  a  way  of  investigating. 
It  is  something  assumed,  a  belief  adopted,  because 
we  need  it.  The  justification  of  it  is  not  any  proof, 
but  the  fact  that  it  appears  to  be  necessary  for  the 
existence  and  progress  of  science.  Whatever  funda- 
mental assumptions,  or  postulates,  are  thus  necessary 
constitute  the  third  group  of  scientific  principles. 

These  Distinctions  of  Kind  not  Absolute. — No 
absolute  line  of  demarcation  can  be  fixed  between  the 
three  kinds  of  principles  described  above — empirical, 
methodological,  and  postulated.  For  example,  while 
it  is  a  prune  characteristic  of  empirical  principles, 
such  as  Newton's  law  of  universal  gravitation,  that 
they  are  results,  or  fruits,  of  inquiry — that  is,  they 
are  discovered — yet  hi  a  sense  methodological  princi- 
ples, too  are  discovered.  They  are  not  the  property 
of  the  mind  in  advance  of  experience;  rather  does 
the  groping,  sentient  organism  stumble  upon  them 
in  the  course  of  its  instinctive  search  for  satisfactory 
experience.  The  methodological  principle  of  analysis 
no  doubt  seems  instinctive  or  innate  to  many  who 
have  been  educated  in  modern  schools;  but  it  was 
not  so  to  men  originally.  Its  value  had  to  be  learned 
by  use;  that  is,  it  was  a  discovery.  It  is  properly 
simply  a  way  in  which  mind  has  come  to  act  success- 
fully, at  first  by  accident,  later  through  the  natural 
preference  for  what  yields  satisfactory  results.  On 
the  other  hand,  an  empirical  principle,  like  that  of 


PRINCIPLES  29 

gravitation,  while  it  is  a  discovery,  is  yet  of  such 
world-wide  application  that  it  gains  also  a  certain 
methodological  character,  because  it  conditions  all 
subsequent  natural  inquiry.  No  mechanical  investi- 
gator would  think  for  a  moment  of  leaving  gravita- 
tion (weight)  out  of  account  in  his  hypotheses  and 
experiments.  It  has  become  for  him  a  guide  in  inves- 
tigation, and  a  standard  for  expectation,  and  is  thus 
in  a  measure  methodological,  although  primarily 
empirical.  Again,  a  postulated  principle,  like  that 
of  uniformity,  may  find  confirmation  so  constantly  hi 
experience  as  to  be  taken  by  many  for  an  empirical 
one — a  discovered  truth. 

Nevertheless  the  distinctions  made  are  of  value. 
A  fundamental  postulate  does  differ  from  a  method- 
ological principle  in  stating  something  about  nature 
as  trite,  and  from  an  empirical  principle  hi  requiring 
acceptance  without  proof,  that  is,  on  fundamentally 
practical  grounds.  Empirical  and  methodological 
principles  also  do  differ  from  one  another  in  the  im- 
portant respect  that  the  former  present  us  with 
actual  experience  in  its  relations  while  the  latter  are 
simply  ways  of  ascertaining  those  relations;  the  for- 
mer are  the  results  of  scientific  method,  while  the 
latter  constitute  scientific  method.  Furthermore, 
while  methodological  principles  are  in  a  sense  dis- 
covered, they  were  not  originally,  and  are  not  gener- 
ally, discoveries  due  to  effort  directed  to  any  such 
end.  In  the  main,  they  have  been  found  by  accident. 
Like  Saul  searching  for  his  father's  asses  and  finding 
a  kingdom,  they  are  the  rich  incidents  of  inquiries 
which  had  a  different  purpose.  Methodological, 


30  METHODS 

also,  differ  from  empirical  principles  in  that  in  them- 
selves they  tell  us  nothing  about  the  natures  of 
things.  The  principle  of  analysis,  though  no  doubt 
it  suggests  that  things  are  more  or  less  susceptible  of 
separation  into  parts,  yet  in  itself  tells  us  nothing 
about  the  constitution  of  the  world.  It  is  merely  a 
way  of  going  to  work. 

In  the  discussion  of  these  three  types,  the  basic 
conceptions,  or  fundamental  postulates,  will  be 
considered  last,  that  being  their  actual  position  in 
critical  recognition.  Of  the  other  two,  the  empirical 
principles,  being  the  results  of  inquiry,  are  those 
which  bulk  largest  in  the  popular  eye.  The  critical 
student,  however,  recognizes  that  the  processes  of 
science — its  methods — being  the  means  through 
which  the  results  have  been  achieved,  are  equally 
worthy  of  study;  and,  since  they  are  organically 
connected  with  the  processes  of  logic — supposed  to 
be  familiar  to  the  reader — these  will  occupy  us  first. 

Methodological  Principles — Analysis. — It  was  un- 
questionably long  before  the  dawn  of  either  science 
or  history  that  men  discovered  that  they  could  under- 
stand things  better  by  considering  them  piecemeal 
— part  by  part.  Crossing  of  streams,  scaling  of  crags, 
and  conflicts  with  beasts  must  very  early  have  taught 
them  this  lesson.  Indeed,  to  act  upon  more  or  less 
discriminating  examinations  of  objects  no  doubt 
became  a  habit,  and  a  quasi-hereditary  habit,  long 
before  reflection  arose  and  men  became  aware  that 
they  were  taking  things  apart  in  their  minds,  that  is, 
analyzing  them.  Much  later  still  was  it  when  it  oc- 
curred to  thinkers  to  formulate  a  rule  of  inquiry  to 


PRINCIPLES  31 

the  effect  that  the  subject-matter  under  investiga- 
tion should  always  be  separated  into  the  simplest 
parts  possible.  So  late  as  the  seventeenth  century 
Descartes  announces  this  rule  of  method  as  one  of 
his  own  discovery — "to  divide  each  of  the  difficulties 
under  examination  into  as  many  parts  as  possible, 
and  as  might  be  necessary  for  its  adequate  solution."  8 
This  was  a  sound  practical  insight  of  Descartes, 
for  in  the  analytic  process  there  is  a  systematic 
focusing  of  attention  upon  part  after  part  which 
makes  for  clearer  and  more  thorough  perception. 
Less  obvious  elements,  which  might  easily  be  over- 
looked, are  brought  into  notice,  and  the  connections 
between  them  recognized.  Every  one  who  has  taken 
a  machine  apart  attentively  knows  how  much  he 
learned  about  it  by  so  doing.  Analysis  does  more, 
however,  than  bring  out  the  detail.  As  we  saw  in  the 
case  of  Franklin's  discovery  regarding  the  lightning, 
it  makes  possible  also  the  recognition  of  underlying 
similarities  between  things — for  example,  the  com- 
mon nature  of  the  electric  spark  and  the  lightning 
flash.  Hence  it  is  the  first  stage  of  classification  and 
generalization,  and  so  of  induction  also,  which  starts 
with  generalization.  It  is  no  less  needful  for  the  recog- 
nition of  fixed  sequences  (causes  and  effects).  When 
we  look  backward  searching  for  the  cause  of  an  event, 
it  is  only  by  careful  analysis  of  the  preceding  situa- 

»  "Method,"  Pt.  II,  2nd  Rule.  If  this  was  a  new  discovery  to 
Descartes,  it  was  not  new  to  thought  at  that  late  day.  It  was  sub- 
stantially identical  with  Galileo's  "Method  of  Resolution,"  which 
was  but  the  broadened,  empirical  application  of  the  scholastic  Metho- 
dus  Resolutiva,  which  in  turn  was  derived  from  the  teachings  of 
Aristotle. 


32  METHODS 

tion  that  we  are  able  to  determine  the  indispensable 
antecedents; 4  and  when  we  look  forward  and  seek 
to  anticipate  effects,  it  is  impossible  to  do  so  success- 
fully unless  we  study  the  present  situation  analyti- 
cally, and  make  sure  just  what  the  circumstances 
are.  A  Ley  den  jar,  for  example,  will  act  in  a  given 
way  only  when  the  conditions  are  right;  and  these 
conditions  are  to  be  known  only  by  analytical  obser- 
vation. 

Now,  as  we  learned  in  Chapter  I,  the  great  aim  of 
science  is  to  establish  relations  of  these  two  kinds, 
similarity,  or  common  character,  and  fixed  sequence, 
or  cause  and  effect.  A  fact,  or  phenomenon,  which 
it  can  relate  up  with  no  other  facts,  either  by  signif- 
icant resemblance  or  uniform  sequence,  is  for  science 
far  from  being  a  satisfactory  thing.  It  is  a  puzzle 
and  a  challenge,  a  problem  to  be  solved;  and  the  solu- 
tion always  begins  with  analysis,  that  is,  critical, 
discriminating  study.  It  is  evident,  therefore,  that 
analysis  is  the  fundamental  or  initial  process  in 
distinctively  scientific  inquiry. 

Synthesis. — Synthesis  is,  of  course,  the  antithesis 
of  analysis,  being  constructive  over  against  the  quasi- 
destructiveness  of  the  latter  process.  It  consists  in 
putting  together  relatively  simple  things  in  such  a 
way  as  to  produce  complex  or  (better)  compound 
results.  The  syntheses  of  the  chemical  laboratory  by 
which  acids,  bases,  and  salts  are  produced  are  fa- 
miliar illustrations  of  the  process  in  general .  Synthesis 
in  all  departments  is  a  cardinal  scientific  method. 

4  The  student  is  supposed  to  be  familiar  with  this  fact  through 
his  study  of  the  inductive  methods  of  logic. 


PRINCIPLES  33 

Like  analysis  it  leads  to  a  better  understanding  of 
the  phenomena  under  examination  by  securing  closer 
attention  to  the  parts  and  the  interrelations  of  things 
and  processes.  To  know  how  things  go  together  to 
make  a  whole  is  something  more  than  to  know  them 
separately,  or  even  to  know  the  whole  and  how  it 
comes  apart.  A  child  soon  learns  to  take  a  toy  to 
pieces,  but  the  knowledge  thus  gained  is  vague  com- 
pared with  that  attained  when  he  learns  to  put  it  to- 
gether again;  and  the  principle  holds  true  in  later 
life  when  the  child  becomes  a  mechanist  or  a  chemist. 

Mental  Construction. — We,  however,  are  con- 
cerned only  with  the  type  of  synthesis  which  is  com- 
mon to  all  the  sciences,  and  to  the  arts  and  ordinary 
life  as  well,  that  is,  mental  synthesis,  which  is  also 
called  logical  construction;  and  in  this  direction  the 
bringing  out  of  detail  is  but  a  small  part  of  the  ser- 
vice that  synthesis  renders.  Through  mental  syn- 
thesis made  under  proper  conditions  we  are  able  to 
attain  results  which  perception  alone  (observation 
etc.),  however  analytic,  can  never  furnish.  That 
there  are  chemical  compounds,  synthetic  products 
of  the  chemical  laboratory,  which  are  never  found 
native — many  explosives,  for  example — and  which 
therefore  could  never  be  discovered  by  analysis,  is  a 
familiar  fact.  Equally  true  and  vastly  more  impor- 
tant is  the  fact  that  in  the  realm  of  thought  there  are 
many  things,  both  existences  and  laws,  which  are 
discoverable  only  by  putting  together  in  critically  ap- 
proved ways  the  elements  of  knowledge  which  ana- 
lytic observation  furnishes. 

The  solar  system  as  such  is  an  example.    As  the 


34  METHODS 

children  of  modern  culture  we  all  of  us  accept  the 
Copernican-Newtonian  account  of  it.  Relatively 
to  our  planet,  we  affirm  without  question  that  the 
sun  is  the  central  and  fixed  body  and  the  earth  the 
revolving  one.  So  of  Venus  and  Mars  and  the  sister 
planets — all  move  in  elliptical  orbits  regularly  and 
ceaselessly  around  that  one  vast  shining  orb.  How 
do  we  know  this?  Assuredly  not  by  the  uncriticized 
evidence  of  our  senses,  for  to  our  eyes,  as  to  the  eyes 
of  Greeks  and  Chaldeans,  the  sun  seems  to  move 
across  the  sky,  and  the  planets  seem  to  shift  their 
places  in  perplexing  ways  that  are  by  no  means  ellip- 
tical, and  that  apparently  did  not  suggest  ellipses 
to  any  one  before  Kepler.5  Most  of  us,  of  course, 
accept  the  modern  view  on  the  authority  of  the  as- 
tronomers. Probably  a  large  number  of  persons  add 
to  this  (proper)  credence  the  notion  that  the  astron- 
omer with  his  telescope  is  able  to  see  these  heavenly 
movements  as  they  really  are.  Such  is  far  from  being 
the  case.  So  far  as  the  apparent  movements  of  sun, 
moon,  and  stars  go,  the  telescope  tells  precisely  the 
same  story  as  the  naked  eye.  The  astronomer  in 
interpreting  the  planetary  movements  has  to  do  the 
same  thing  as  the  rest  of  us,  that  is,  set  aside  the 
ordinary,  and  seemingly  instinctive,  inferences  of 
the  mind  concerning  what  it  perceives,  and  has  to 
imagine  for  himself  a  system  of  movements  which 
are  largely  different  from  what  he  witnesses  through 

5  Kepler,  Johann  (1571-1630),  an  eminent  German  astronomer, 
was  one  of  the  founders  of  modern  astronomy.  He  discovered  that 
the  planets  move  in  ellipses,  not  circles,  with  the  sun  at  one  focus; 
and  he  framed  in  mathematical  terms  the  great  laws  which  describe 
their  movements. 


PRINCIPLES  35 

the  telescope.  As  little  as  any  other  man  has  he  ever 
seen  the  earth,  or  any  other  planet,  move  around  the 
sun.  He  conceives  the  planets  so  to  move,  because 
such  a  conception,  when  all  the  perceived  movements 
are  taken  into  account,  explains  them  better.  His 
modern  conception  is  more  satisfactory  by  far  than 
the  ancient  views  in  the  way  of  providing  the  solar 
system  with  an  (inferred)  mechanical  and  dynamic 
machinery  which  is  at  once  simple  and  in  harmony 
with  known  mechanical  laws.  Therefore  he  adopts 
that  conception,  and  tells  us  it  is  true.  No  man, 
however,  has  ever  seen  the  solar  system  as  a  system; 
that  is  as  a  vast  cluster  of  bodies  in  unitary  elliptical 
movement.  It  is  a  construction  of  the  mind;  it  is 
manufactured  knowledge. 

Other  examples  of  such  systematic  synthetic 
thought  are  the  geologic  history  of  the  earth,  the 
molecular  constitution  of  material  things,  and  indeed 
all  laws  of  nature,  all  of  which  are  constructions  of 
the  mind,  and  none  of  them  objects  of  perception.6 

Materials  of  Thought. — It  is  important  to  note 
that  mental  construction  works  with  two,  or  more, 
distinct  kinds  of  material.  There  are,  first,  the  ob- 
jects of  sense  perception — stones  and  stars,  liquids 
and  gasses,  plants  and  animals — and,  second,  various 

•When  thought  syntheses  are  made  in  the  order  of  their  com- 
plexity, we  have  the  type  of  mental  process  which  Descartes  com- 
mended when  he  formulated  his  rule  of  conducting  his  thoughts  in 
such  order  that,  by  commencing  with  objects  the  simplest  and 
easiest  to  know,  he  "might  ascend  by  little,  and  as  it  were  step  by 
step,  to  the  knowledge  of  the  more  complex."  ("  Method,"  Pt.  II, 
3d  Rule.)  This  corresponds  largely  to  Galileo's  "Method  of  Com- 
position" and  the  scholastic  methodus  compoeitiva. 


36  METHODS 

universal  ideas  or  laws,  such  as  chemical  affinity, 
inertia,  and  the  other  empirical  principles  of  science. 
The  first  are  concrete  existences  which  prove  them- 
selves by  the  way  they  affect  us;  they  are  the  data, 
the  facts  or  phenomena  of  science.  The  second  are 
abstract,  theoretical  factors,  which  are  properly  to  be 
received  as  actual  existences  only  in  so  far  as  they 
are  found  to  be  involvea  in  the  facts.  At  their  best 
they  are  truths  or  principles;  often  they  are  mere 
hypotheses.  In  addition  to  these  two  elements  in 
mental  synthesis,  there  may  be,  when  need  arises,  a 
third  or  intermediate  kind  of  material,  that  is,  con- 
crete objects  which,  being  purely  theoretical,  have 
the  rank  of  concrete  ideas  and  not  of  facts.  Such 
are  molecules  and  atoms,  the  ether  and  the  soul. 

In  the  mental  construct  which  we  call  the  solar 
system  the  moving,  shining  dots  in  the  sky,  together 
with  the  sun  and  earth,  constitute  the  facts  or  data; 
the  notions  of  motion,  momentum,  gravitation,  etc., 
are  the  universal  ideas;  while  the  ether,  which  is 
posited  (that  is,  affirmed  to  exist)  for  the  purpose  of 
explaining  the  solar  system's  optical  phenomena, 
belongs  to  the  third  group  of  the  mind's  construction 
materials — the  concrete  ideas. 

The  thought  that  the  mind  in  its  syntheses  uses 
materials  naturally  raises  the  question,  how  these 
materials  are  supplied.  So  far  as  the  first  kind  is 
concerned,  the  answer  is  evident:  they  are  supplied 
by  sense  perception — sight,  touch,  hearing,  etc. — 
though  in  scientific  thought  the  effort  is  always  to 
have  the  perception,  that  is,  observation,  of  an  ana- 
lytic and  critical  character.  The  theoretical  factors 


PRINCIPLES  37 

in  mental  construction  are  not  given  sc  immediately. 
They  are  abstract;  that  is,  they  have  been  drawn  by 
reflective  thought  from  the  facts,  usually  through  a 
comparison  of  a  large  number  of  objects.  They  are 
thus  mind-made,  and  by  processes  of  which  analysis 
is  the  first  and  all-important  step.  In  general,  there- 
fore, we  may  say  that  observation  and  analysis  fur- 
nish the  materials  by  means  of  which  synthetic 
thought  rears  its  edifices  of  knowledge.  The  synthetic 
thought  itself  seems  to  consist  largely  in  selecting 
judiciously  from  these  materials  and  putting  together 
the  elements  (facts)  so  chosen  in  one  way  after  an- 
other until  a  combination  of  them  is  found  which  forms 
a  scheme  of  the  way  things  exist  and  act  in  the  world 
which  is  satisfactory  to  the  mind. 

Synthesis,  Analysis,  Cause. — The  philosopher 
Spinoza  would  not  allow  that  any  acquaintance  with 
an  object  was  properly  to  be  considered  knowledge 
which  did  not  include  acquaintance  with  its  cause. 
Scientific  thought  is  of  much  the  same  opinion.  For 
the  man  of  science  causal  knowledge  is  the  highest 
kind  of  knowledge.  But  knowkdge  of  things  through 
their  causes  is  itself  evidently  a  synthetic  process;  it 
involves  a  putting  together  in  the  mind  of  percep- 
tions (the  phenomena  present  to  the  senses)  and  other 
objects  remembered  or  conceived  (the  causes).  It  is 
allied  to  deduction,  which  is  also  synthetic,  the  prem- 
ises being  combined  to  produce  the  conclusion.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  discovery  of  causes  requires  analysis,  as 
is  evident  when  we  reflect  on  how  Franklin  discovered 
the  cause  of  the  lightning  to  be  electricity.  In  dealing 
with  phenomena,  we  approach  natural  processes 


38  METHODS 

from  the  effect  end,  an  end  which  is  the  concreted 
result  of  many  causes  efficient  in  varying  degrees,  and 
to  find  these  causes — now  no  longer  on  the  scene — 
patient,  critical  analysis  of  the  traces  left  by  them 
in  the  effect  is  necessary.  Such  analysis,  supple- 
mented as  it  must  be  by  clear  insight  and  wise  syn- 
thesis, is  generally  a  difficult  and  slow  process,  as 
anyone  may  see  who  will  compare  the  difference  in 
ease  in  constructing  and  guessing  a  riddle.  Nat- 
ural situations  generally  present  themselves  to  the 
inquirer  as  riddles,  and  riddles  to  which  commonly 
his  clues  seem  all  too  scanty. 

Jevons  has  laid  a  just  emphasis  upon  this  truth  in 
his  distinction  between  the  Method  of  Discovery  and 
the  Method  of  Instruction. 

"The  method  of  discovery,"  he  says,  "is  employed 
in  the  acquisition  of  knowledge,  and  really  consists 
in  those  processes  of  inference  and  induction  by  which 
general  truths  are  ascertained  from  the  collection  and 
examination  of  particular  facts.  .  .  .  The  second 
method  (Instruction)  only  applies  when  knowledge 
has  already  been  acquired  and  expressed  in  the  form 
of  general  laws,  rules,  principles,  or  truths,  so  that 
we  have  only  to  make  ourselves  acquainted  with  these 
and  observe  the  due  mode  of  applying  them  to  par- 
ticular cases,  in  order  to  possess  a  complete  acquaint- 
ance with  the  subject"  7 — as,  for  instance,  in  mas- 
tering a  foreign  language  or  a  natural  science  from  a 
text-book.  "The  principles  of  mechanics  .  .  .  seem 
comparatively  simple  and  obvious  as  explained  to  us 
in  books  of  instruction.  But  the  early  philosophers 

7  "Lessons  in  Logic,"  p.  202. 


PRINCIPLES  39 

did  not  possess  such  books;  they  had  only  the  Book 
of  Nature  in  which  is  set  forth,  not  the  laws,  but  the 
results  of  the  laws,  and  it  was  only  after  the  most 
patient  and  skilful  investigation,  and  after  hundreds 
of  mistakes,  that  those  laws  were  ascertained"  8,  so 
much  slower  is  the  method  of  discovery.  "A  few 
nights  of  observation  might  have  convinced  an  as- 
tronomer, viewing  the  solar  system  from  its  center, 
that  the  planets  traveled  round  the  sun;  but  the  fact 
that  our  place  of  observation  is  one  of  the  traveling 
planets  so  complicates  the  apparent  motions  of  the 
other  bodies,  that  it  required  all  the  sagacity  of 
Copernicus  to  prove  the  real  simplicity  of  the  plan- 
etary system.  It  is  the  same  throughout  nature;  the 
laws  may  be  simple,  but  their  combined  effects  are 
not  simple,  and  we  have  no  clue  to  guide  us  through 
their  intricacies.  'It  is  the  glory  of  God,'  said  Solo- 
mon, 'to  conceal  a  thing,  but  the  glory  of  a  king  to 
search  it  out.'  The  laws  of  nature  are  the  invaluable 
secrets  which  God  has  hidden,  and  it  is  the  kingly 
prerogative  of  the  philosopher  to  search  them  out  by 
industry  and  sagacity."  9 

The  distinction  between  these  methods  is  a  just 
and  important  one;  yet  it  is  to  be  doubted  if  it  cor- 
responds as  closely  to  the  difference  between  analysis 
and  synthesis  as  Jevons  thinks.  The  searching  out 
is  by  no  means  a  matter  of  mere  analysis.  Indeed, 
his  concluding  word  "sagacity  "suggests  the  contrary. 
The  synthetic  processes  of  association,  selection, 
hypothesis,  and  verification  are  also  required.  Nor, 

8  id.,  p.  204. 

9  "Principles  of  Science,"  p.  126. 


40  METHODS 

on  the  other  hand,  is  the  logical  exposition  of  a  sub- 
ject ever  a  matter  of  pure  synthesis.  The  expositor 
must  arrange  the  parts  of  his  subject  in  a  logical  way, 
and  this  requires  him  to  analyze  it  afresh.  The  truth 
is  that  analytic  and  synthetic  thought  processes  are 
complementary,  like  the  opposite  swings  of  a  pen- 
dulum. Thought  would  soon  come  to  a  standstill  if 
confined  to  either  alone. 

EXERCISES 

1.  It  is  now  established  that  the  dark  transverse  lines  in  the 
solar  spectrum  discovered  by  Fraunhofer,   and  named  after 
him,  are  identical  in  position  with  the  bright  lines  which  con- 
stitute the  spectra  of  certain  substances,  and  that  the  dark  lines 
are  due  to  the  presence  of  the  vapors  of  these  substances  in  the 
atmosphere  of  the  sun,  since  a  luminous  body  (such  as  an  in- 
candescent gas)  absorbs  at  a  lower  temperature  the  very  type 
of  ether  waves  which  at  a  higher  temperature  it  emits.     (Cf. 
Kimball's  "College  Physics,"  pp.  620-629).    Show  in  some  detail 
how  each  of  the  three  main  kinds  of  principles  of  science  are  in- 
volved in  this  discovery. 

2.  A.  Point  out  all  the  cases  of  analysis  which  occur  in  any 
two  of  the  following  passages: — 

(1)  Tyndall,  "Forms  of  Water,"  sees.  1  and  2. 

(2)  Darwin,  "Descent  of  Man",  I,  pp.  5-11. 

(3)  Lodge,  "Modern  Views  of  Electricity",  chap.  I. 

(4)  Young,  "The  Sun,"  introd. 

(5)  Shaler,  "Aspects  of  the  Earth",  pp.  1-14. 

B.  Do  the  same  with  all  the  cases  of  synthesis  that  occur 
in  these  passages. 

3.  A.  When  we  say  we  know  the  earth  to  be  a  sphere,  what 
parts  of  that  knowledge  are  actual  perceptions   (knowledge 
through  the  senses),  or  facts,  and  what  parts  are  due  to  mental 
synthesis? 

B.  Make  the  same  distinction  in  the  case  of  our  knowledge 
of  the  hydrogen  atom  as  the  lightest  of  the  atoms. 


PRINCIPLES  41 

4.  Make  plain  the  three  different  kinds  of  thought  materials 
(telling  which  is  which)  involved  in  the  scientific  account  of 
combustion  as  being  a  process  of  combination  of  oxygen  atoms 
with  atoms  of  carbon  and  hydrogen,  the  outcome  being  the 
compound  molecules  COa  and  HaO. 

5.  Why  is  discovery  so  much  harder  than  instruction?    Illus- 
trate the  matter. 

(1)  From  the  case  of  Columbus  and  the  egg. 

(2)  From  that  of  repeating,  or  even  making,  a  riddle  and 
solving  it. 

(3)  From  that  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood  as  it  appeared 
to  Descartes  ("Method"  Pt.  V)  and  as  it  appears  to  the  student 
of  a  modern  text-book  on  physiology. 

(4)  From  that  of  the  nature  of  Induction,  as  explained  by 
Jevons  in  his  "Principles  of  Science",  pp.  121-126,  127-8. 

6.  Make  a  careful  abstract  of  chapter  3  of  J.  A.  Thomson's 
"  Introduction  to  Science." 


CHAPTER  III 
POSITIVISM 

Dangers  of  Mental  Construction. — It  must  have 
occurred  to  some  readers  of  the  last  chapter  that  men- 
tal synthesis  is  a  process  very  liable  to  error.  Human 
constructions  of  all  kinds  are  faulty  at  first,  the  faults 
often  entailing  disaster;  and  it  is  not  otherwise  with 
the  constructions  of  thought.  Rather  do  man's  mis- 
takes in  forming  complex  ideas  (explanations,  plans, 
etc.)  seem  to  be  the  main  causes  of  his  failures  in  new 
practical  enterprises. 

Perhaps  no  more  pitiful  story  has  come  down  to  us 
than  that  of  the  children's  crusade,  a  romantic  under- 
taking through  which  in  the  twelfth  century  some 
fifty  thousand  children  either  perished  at  sea,  or  else- 
where, or  were  sold  into  Moslem  slavery. 

The  movement  was  the  outcome  of  a  process  of 
constructive  thought,  partly  religious  and  partly  met- 
aphysical. Starting  from  Bernard  of  Clairvaux's  l 
not  unreasonable  claim  that  the  failure  of  the  second 
crusade  was  due  to  the  sinf ulness  of  the  crusaders,  it 
was  argued  that  a  crusade  conducted  by  innocent  and 
zealous  individuals — children,  for  example — could  not 

1  Bernard  of  Clairvaux,  Saint  (1091-1153),  was  a  French  ecclesi- 
astic of  the  highest  character,  and  of  great  popular  and  political  in- 
fluence.   He  was  a  Cistercian  monk,  who  in  time  became  abbot  of 
the  monastery  of  Clairvaux.    He  preached  the  second  crusade. 
42 


POSITIVISM  43 

fail  to  succeed.  Was  not  the  crusading  cause  the 
cause  of  God,  and  could  he  possibly  allow  it  to  fail 
when  those  embarked  in  it — the  innocent  children — 
were  true  and  worthy  representatives  of  it  and  him? 
It  is  easy  to  look  back  upon  this  argument  now,  and 
see  that  it  was  a  nest  of  assumptions;  but  it  was  not 
easy  to  see  the  error  of  it  in  Western  Europe  in  the 
twelfth  century;  for  the  righteousness  of  the  Christian 
cause  in  the  conflict  with  Islam  was  the  conviction 
of  virtually  every  one,  while  the  line  of  action  ex- 
pected of  the  Deity  was  precisely  that  which  would  be 
taken  by  a  high-minded  feudal  ruler.  The  children's 
crusade  was  thus  a  case  where  plausible,  but  none 
the  less  erroneous,  mental  construction  led  to  disaster. 
Unhappily  it  was  but  a  specially  pitiful  example  of  an 
innumerable  class.2 

Another  and  recent  instance  on  a  large  scale  is  the 
collapse  on  August  29,  1907,  of  the  great  Quebec 
railroad  bridge,  then  in  process  of  construction. 
Without  warning  it  fell  of  its  own  weight  into  the 
waters  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  carrying  seventy-four 
workmen  down  to  death  and  reducing  20,000  tons 
of  steel  to  scrap.  To  the  bridge  engineers  of  this 
country  this  was  a  catastrophe  of  the  first  magnitude; 
for  the  destruction  of  these  men  and  the  loss  of  mil- 
lions of  money  were  due  neither  to  the  rage  of  the 
elements  nor  to  any  imperfections  in  the  foundations, 

*  It  should  not  be  overlooked  that  an  edifice  of  thought  may  do 
harm  when  no  manifest  mischance  is  reckoned  to  its  account;  for 
it  may  stand  when  it  should  fall.  It  may  remain  as  an  obstacle  in 
the  path  of  progress  generation  after  generation,  as  did,  for  exam- 
ple, the  long  established  doctrine  of  man's  central  position  in  the 
universe. 


44  METHODS 

but  purely  to  miscalculation  on  the  part  of  the  engi- 
neers. They  were  attempting  a  mechanical  con- 
struction on  an  unprecedented  scale — virtually  doing 
a  new  thing — and  their  plans  failed  to  work. 

There  may  be  conservatives  who  will  argue  from 
such  facts  that  men  should  refrain  from  mental  con- 
structions, or  at  least  from  acting  upon  them;  but  the 
more  active  part  of  mankind  will  not  heed  such  coun- 
sels, for  it  is  through  mental  constructions  tested  in 
action  that  progress  in  civilization  is  made.  Yet  it 
is  evident  that  synthetic  thought,  though  it  is  indeed 
a  process  of  highest  importance,  is  yet  fraught  with 
grave  danger,  and  that  controlling  principles  or 
rules  for  safeguarding  it  are  greatly  needed.  In  the 
course  of  scientific  discussion  in  the  last  five  hundred 
years  several  such  principles  of  thought  control  have 
been  proposed,  and  some  of  them  have  won  their  way 
to  general  acceptance.  In  the  main,  they  are  prin- 
ciples of  what  is  known  as  rigor  or  severe  caution. 
Their  aim  is  to  restrain  the  mind's  combining  activity, 
and  keep  it  to  safe  courses;  to  put  a  bit  into  the  mouth 
of  the  psychic  Pegasus  and  keep  him  from  throwing 
his  rider. 

When  one  reflects  over  the  argument  in  justifica- 
tion of  the  children's  crusade,  the  most  remarkable 
thing  about  it  from  our  modern  point  of  view  seems 
to  be  the  small  account  it  takes  of  every-day  facts. 
Innocence  and  religious  zeal  are  assumed  to  be  evi- 
dence of  heavenly  appointment;  there  appears  to 
have  been  no  inquiry  as  to  whether  these  qualities 
were  actually  divine  credentials  for  a  religious  war. 
Moreover,  children  in  ordinary  life,  whatever  their 


POSITIVISM  45 

innocence  and  zeal,  are  not  more  immune  than  adults 
from  disease,  from  drowning  when  shipwrecked,  and 
from  the  violence  of  ruthless  soldiery;  neither  do  such 
qualities  render  them  proficient  and  powerful  war- 
riors. Yet  just  these  unchildlike  characteristics  the 
argument  required  them  to  display  when  they  were 
enrolled  as  crusaders.  That  expectation  was  evi- 
dently based,  not  on  facts,  but  on  theological  theory, 
as  was  so  common  in  the  middle  ages. 

Positivism. — In  reaction  from  this  kind  of  think- 
ing, and  in  opposition  to  it,  the  first  principle  of  rigor 
to  make  its  way  to  general  acceptance,  and  thereby 
to  mark  the  commencement  of  the  modern  era,  was 
what  is  now  known  as  scientific  positivism.  Toward 
the  close  of  the  middle  ages  the  conviction  arose 
that  a  primary  place  in  thought  constructions  should 
be  given  to  facts  as  distinguished  from  doctrines,  that 
is,  theories  about  facts.  The  conviction  came  to  clear 
expression  first  in  the  English  Franciscan  monk,  Roger 
Bacon,3  who  as  has  been  said,  with  all  his  energy 
"called  the  science  of  his  time  from  authorities  to 
things,  from  opinions  to  sources,  from  dialectic  to 
experience,  from  books  to  nature."  *  This  teaching 
was  continued  by  his  successors  in  the  Franciscan 
order — also  Britons — Duns  Scotus  and  William  of 

1  Bacon,  Roger  (1214-1294),  was  an  English  Franciscan  friar  of 
original  mind  and  great  attainments.  He,  with  the  two  other 
notable  British  Franciscans  who  succeeded  him — Duns  Scotus  and 
William  of  Occam — may  be  regarded  as  the  direct  source  from  which 
modern  scientific  thought  has  sprung.  He  was  imprisoned  many 
years  by  his  ecclesiastical  superiors  on  the  ground  of  heresy;  but  the 
heresy  seems  to  have  been  merely  the  modern  scientific  principle 
that  facts  rank  higher  than  theories. 

'Windelband,  "Hist,  of  Philosophy,"  p.  344. 


46  METHODS 

Occam.  It  is  a  matter  of  course  in  the  thinking  of 
to-day;  but  at  first  it  won  its  way  but  slowly  against 
the  doctrinaire  habits  of  centuries.  In  the  revival  of 
physical  science  which  followed  the  renaissance, 
however,  it  met  with  an  enthusiastic  response. 
Francis  Bacon,  often  regarded  as  the  originator  of  it, 
was  really  but  the  mouthpiece  of  the  science  of  his 
day  in  his  insistence  that  the  facts  of  nature  as  dis- 
covered in  experience  are  the  most  certain  and  au- 
thoritative elements  of  knowledge. 

Positivism  6  stands  for  the  underlying  or  regulative 
conviction  of  men  of  science  that  facts  (that  is, 
phenomena  vouched  for  by  the  direct  evidence  of 
the  senses)  are  present  to  us  and  exist  for  us  in  a  real, 
lively,  coercive  way  attained  by  no  other  object  of 
the  mind.  Other  things  being  equal,  the  more  im- 
mediate a  cognition  is  the  higher  its  rightful  rank  in 
the  scale  of  certitude.  Facts,  being  largely  immedi- 
ate knowledge,  constitute  the  data  of  inquiry,  the 
fundamental  building  material  of  knowledge,  its 
construction  stones,  first  to  be  quarried  (discovered) 
and  then  to  be  built  into  its  walls.  In  the  long  gen- 
erations of  medieval  discussion  it  had  been  customary 
to  give  past  generalizations  and  interpretations 
authority  over  new  discovery.  According  to  the 
logical  canon  of  agreement  new  truth  should  agree 
with  old;  it  was  too  often  overlooked  that  this  rule 
applies  only  to  new  mental  construction,  not  to  new 
data.  So,  with  endless  hindrance  to  the  advance  of 
knowledge,  the  effort  was  to  force  every  new  fact 

•Only  scientific  positivism  is  referred  to  here.  Philosophical 
positivism  will  be  considered  later. 


POSITIVISM  47 

under  the  form — too  often  under  the  yoke — of  past 
interpretations.  When  this  was  not  feasible,  new 
phenomena  were  apt  to  be  ignored,  or  indifferently 
dismissed  as  exceptions.6  The  principle  of  positivism 
holds,  on  the  contrary,  that  attested  phenomena 
have  a  certainty  and  a  normative  value  which  set 
them  in  a  class  by  themselves.  To  use  them  success- 
fully it  is  necessary  to  take  them  as  they  are,  regard- 
less of  theoretical  consequences.  When  genuine, 
they  are  unyielding,  uncompromising,  insistent; 
while  mental  construction  is,  or  should  be,  pliant 
and  accommodative.  The  latter  should  never  be 
coercive  until  the  facts  make  it  so;  it  should  be  sub- 
servient to  phenomena,  and  never  seek  to  override 
them  or  explain  them  away.  Even  laws  should  never 
become  authoritative  requirements  laid  upon  the 
facts,  but  rather  authoritative  declarations  issued  by 
the  facts.  Indeed,  no  theory  or  law,  however  well 
established,  is  safe  from  attacks  due  to  newly  dis- 
covered (and  attested)  phenomena.  The  modern 
astronomer  does  not  hesitate  to  challenge  even  the 
law  of  gravitation,  if  stellar  movements  appear  to 
conflict  with  it. 

The  principle  of  positivism  though  rarely  ques- 
tioned is  yet  not  so  firmly  established  as  to  be  be- 
yond trespass.  The  theorizing,  constructive  ten- 
dency of  the  human  mind  is  often  restive  under  it, 
even  in  scientific  adherents.  For  example,  it  is  a 
claim  frequently  made  in  behalf  of  physical  science 

•The  contrast  of  this  habit  with  the  modern  scientific  custom 
is  seen  in  the  fact  that  to  Darwin  the  exceptions  were  the  points  of 
greatest  interest. 


48  METHODS 

that  it  assumes  the  world  to  be  rational  throughout, 
all  events  being  governed  by  intelligible  laws.  The 
seeming  exceptions  to  the  reign  of  law,  it  is  urged, 
are  really  but  cases  of  the  interaction  of  other 
agencies,  themselves  perfectly  orderly,  so  that  to  an 
intelligence  capable  of  understanding  the  cosmos  as 
a  whole  there  would  be  no  exceptions,  no  chance, 
nothing  without  a  " sufficient  reason."  7  We  shall 
have  to  consider  this  conception  later.8  It  is  suffi- 
cient here  to  observe,  that,  if,  as  is  apt  to  be  the 
case,  the  assumption  is  made  as  a  binding  one,  and 
not  merely  as  a  matter  of  faith,  it  evidently  violates 
the  principle  of  positivism,  because  it  demands  in 
advance  that  new  phenomena  shall  agree  with  past 
mental  construction.  Positivism  in  science  is  a  kind 
of  declaration  of  independence  of  all  such  authorita- 
tive demands,  a  matured  determination  to  make 
theory  and  law  interpretative  and  summarizing 
servants  of  the  facts,  not  marshaling  dogmas  to  beat 
them  into  line. 

Law  of  Parsimony. — Mention  has  been  made  of 
William  of  Occam  as  a  prominent  medieval  posi- 
tivist.  To  him  we  are  indebted  for  a  classic  working 
rule  which  embodies  the  positivist  spirit,  though  it 
does  not  use  our  modern  terms.  He  laid  it  down  as  a 
cardinal  maxim  of  inquiry,  that  "Theoretical  ex- 
istences are  not  to  be  increased  without  necessity."  9 
It  will  be  observed  that  this  rule  puts  no  limit  upon 
the  increase  of  facts.  The  field  of  knowledge  is  left 

7  Leibniz'  term. 

8  Cf.  Chapter  XII,  infra. 

9  Entia  non  sunt  multiplicanda  proeter  necessitatem. 


POSITIVISM  49 

unrestricted,  so  far  as  they  are  concerned.  It  does, 
however,  lay  a  stringent,  albeit  flexible,  restriction 
upon  the  second  and  third  kinds  of  thought  materials. 
These  are  to  be  shut  out  altogether,  except  so  far  as 
they  are  found  to  be  necessary  for  the  understanding 
of  the  facts.  The  true  intent  of  Occam's  rule  is 
given  in  Sir  William  Hamilton's  10  paraphrase  of  it, — 
"Neither  more  nor  more  onerous  causes  are  to  be 
assumed  than  are  necessary  to  account  for  the 
phenomena."11 

The  rule  thus  leaves  a  place,  and  often  a  large 
place,  for  mental  construction;  but  it  lays  upon  that 
process  the  rigorous  requirement  of  proving  its 
necessity.  For  example,  shall  we  believe  in  the  pres- 
ence of  a  special  vital  force  in  living  things?  Yes,  if 
such  an  existence  is  necessary  to  explain  the  phe- 
nomena of  life;  no,  if,  as  seems  to  be  the  case,  those 
phenomena  can  be  explained  by  means  of  more 
familiar  and  better  attested  forces. 

Parsimony  evidently  makes  for  scientific  simplicity. 
By  its  exclusion  of  the  needless,  its  sweeping  away 
of  fanciful  and  pet  interpretations,  it  tends  to  keep 
the  subject-matter  of  science  as  simple  as  the  condi- 
tions allow.12  It  makes  also  for  an  increasing  unifica- 
tion of  scientific  conceptions.  As  old  causes,  once 
predicated  to  account  for  phenomena,  are  found  hi 
the  advance  of  discovery  to  be  no  longer  needed, 
since  the  activity  for  which  they  stand  can  be  re- 

10  Hamilton,   Sir   William    (1788-1856),    a   prominent   Scottish 
philosopher,  was  for  many  years  a  professor  in  the  University  of 
Edinburgh. 

"Quoted  by  Karl  Pearson,  "Grammar  of  Science,"  p.  393. 

11  Hence  it  has  been  nicknamed,  "Occam's  razor." 


50  METHODS 

garded  as  part  of  the  working  of  a  more  widespread 
cause,  they  are  deposed  from  their  places  in  the 
scientific  pantheon,  and  only  the  greater  ones  and 
their  interactions  remain.  Thus  centrifugal  force 
has  long  ceased  to  be  an  actual  existence  for  the 
physicist,  the  original  impulse,  conditioned  by  the 
constant  centripetal  influence  of  cohesion  or  gravity, 
being  sufficient  to  account  for  centrifugal  phenomena. 
The  effect  of  such  elimination  of  needless  agencies  is 
to  leave  the  world  with  a  smaller  number  of  forces 
and  to  endow  these  with  a  larger  number  of  relations, 
which  is  evidently  a  unifying  movement  of  thought.13 
Fallacy  of  Reification — The  neglect  of  the  prin- 
ciple of  parsimony  obviously  leaves  an  open  door  for 
divers  errors.  One  of  these  is  the  common  fallacy 
sometimes  called  the  reification  of  abstractions. u  It 
consists  in  making  an  abstraction  from  objects  of 
perception  and  erecting  that  abstraction  into  an 
existence  by  itself.  The  simplest  example  of  it  is 

11  In  Descartes'  famous  rules  of  method  the  fourth  and  last  run 
as  follows:  "In  every  case  to  make  enumerations  so  complete  and 
reviews  so  general  that  I  might  be  assured  that  nothing  was  omitted." 
To  the  modern  reader  this  formula  seems  to  stand  for  that  patient 
thoroughness,  that  insistent  comprehensiveness,  which  is  so  char- 
acteristic of  the  true  man  of  science.  Read  in  this  way,  it  may  be 
considered  a  corollary,  and  an  important  corollary,  of  the  principle 
of  positivism;  for  if  a  construction  of  the  facts  is  to  be  admitted  as 
true  when  it  is  required  by  the  facts,  and  only  then,  it  is  certainly 
of  first  importance  that  all  the  facts  should,  if  possible,  be  in  evi- 
dence. For  the  author  of  the  rule,  however,  its  principal  meaning 
seems  to  have  been  a  kind  of  inductive  or  analogical  preparation  of 
the  subject-matter  for  intellectual  intuition. 

14  Stallo's  term.  This  is  the  real  object  of  criticism  in  Berkeley's 
well  known  argument  against  abstract  ideas.  Cf.  "Prins.  of  Human 
Knowl.,"  Introd. 


POSITIVISM  51 

the  earlier  nature  divinities  of  the  classic  world.  In 
ancient  Rome  every  natural  process  which  bore 
seriously  upon  human  life  was  conceived  as  a  dis- 
tinct superhuman  existence,  or  god,  whose  nature 
and  reason  for  being  were  merely  the  maintenance 
of  that  particular  process.  Thus  the  god  Janus  was 
a  deification  of  the  process  of  beginning;  and  since 
every  undertaking  must  have  a  beginning,  he  was  a 
god  of  universal  activity  and  importance,  and  in 
new  enterprises  was  invoked  even  before  Jupiter. 
So  there  were  special  gods  for  producing  fertility, 
both  in  the  earth  and  hi  animals.  There  were  lares 
for  protecting  the  house  externally  and  penates  for 
guarding  its  store  rooms  within;  and  there  was  a 
goddess,  Vesta,  for  maintaining  the  fire  on  the 
hearth.  When  silver  coinage  was  introduced,  a 
separate  (and  new)  god,  Argentinus,  was  conceived 
to  preside  over  it,  just  as  ^Esculanus  presided  over 
that  of  bronze! 

In  our  own  day  educated  men  who  would  smile 
over  this  ancient  anthropomorphism  not  infre- 
quently fall  into  the  same  sort  of  error.  They  speak 
of  "nature,"  "natural  law,"  "evolution,"  "gravita- 
tion," etc.,  as  efficient  agencies — not  mere  abstrac- 
tions, or  convenient  short-hand  terms  for  aspects  or 
groups  of  phenomena,  but  objective,  controlling 
existences.  Properly  such  a  phrase  as  "the  attrac- 
tion of  gravitation"  is  a  mere  figurative  term  to 
describe  the  fact  that  all  material  objects  tend  to 
move  toward  each  other  at  a  definite  accelerating 
rate,  and  with  a  force  that  varies  inversely  with  the 
square  of  the  distance.  As  such  it  is  perfectly  proper; 


52  METHODS 

but  if  one  thinks  of  the  "attraction"  as  an  existence 
by  itself,  an  agency  acting  upon  objects  and  producing 
the  phenomena,  it  stands  for  merely  one  hypothesis 
among  others,  and  a  very  doubtful  one  at  that.  By 
the  principle  of  parsimony  it  is  to  be  denied  recogni- 
tion as  truth  or  knowledge,  and  the  fallacy  of  reifica- 
tion  is  committed  when  that  principle  is  ignored  in 
its  behalf.  It  can  hardly  be  urged  too  insistently 
that  the  most  useful  abstractions  turn  into  pit-falls 
when  they  are  reified — regarded  as  efficient  entities. 
Philosophic  Positivism. — The  positivism  just  de- 
scribed is  that  of  science.  The  term,  however,  is 
often  used  in  a  philosophic  sense  for  which  there 
is  far  less  justification.  Philosophic  positivism  is 
more  than  a  rule  of  thought  procedure;  it  makes  a 
broad  affirmation  regarding  the  nature  of  the  world, 
which,  if  true,  must  be  either  an  empirical  principle 
or  a  postulate.  It  declares  that  certain  kinds  of 
existence — forces,  minds,  etc. — and  certain  kinds  of 
relations, — causation,  for  example, — are  unknowable. 
David  Hume,15  the  chief  of  the  British  empiricists,  is 
a  radical  representative  of  this  way  of  thinking.  He 
held  that  mental  constructions  are  valid  in  math- 
ematics, because  there  we  are  dealing  with  hypo- 
thetical (that  is,  imaginary)  objects;  but  that  in 

16  Hume,  David  (1711-1776),  was  a  great  British  (Scotch)  philoso- 
pher and  historian.  His  was  one  of  the  keenest  and  most  analytical 
minds  the  British  race  has  produced.  He  found  much  difficulty  in 
securing  a  hearing  from  his  contemporaries,  but  his  influence  upon 
subsequent  psychology  and  philosophy  has  been  immense.  Prejudice 
still  attends  his  name  because  of  his  supposed  opposition  to  religion, 
a  prejudice  which  is  generally  banished  by  a  larger  acquaintance 
with  his  kindly  personality  and  genuinely  inquiring  mind. 


POSITIVISM  53 

physics,  biology,  etc.,  they  are  purely  subjective — 
mere  opinion.  The  mind  cannot  create  or  increase 
knowledge  of  nature. 

Hume  thus  impeaches  all  synthetic  thought 
processes  in  relation  to  actual  existences,  or  "matters 
of  fact."  Facts  are  not  only  primary  in  knowledge; 
they  are  the  whole  of  knowledge,  for  knowledge  is 
awareness  of  objects,  and  natural  objects  can  only 
be  discovered,  not  manufactured.  All  the  inter- 
pretations of  such  objects  made  by  our  minds  are, 
like  atmospheric  effects  upon  distant  features  in  the 
landscape,  no  part  of  the  things  themselves.  They 
may  have  practical  value  as  hypotheses,  working 
rules,  etc.,  but  they  are  not  knowledge.  Knowledge, 
for  Hume,  is  a  perpetual  succession  of  distinct 
("loose  and  separate")  events  or  objects  which  he 
calls  "impressions."  These  are  substantially  what 
we  have  called  facts.  "Every  distinct  perception," 
he  tells  us,  "which  enters  into  the  composition  of  the 
mind  is  a  distinct  existence."  16  Ideas,  that  is, 
memories  and  so  forth,  are  allowed  to  have  standing 
as  knowledge  just  so  far,  and  only  so  far,  as  they  are 
"copies"  of  prior  impressions.  Whatever  actual 
connections  between  these  impressions  there  may  be, 
such  connections  are  never  objects  of  knowledge. 

In  the  case  of  Franklin's  thunder-storm  experi- 
ment Hume  would  say  that  what  Franklin  really 
knew  was  the  dark,  surging  clouds,  the  flashes  of 
light  and  crashes  of  sound  in  their  direction,  the 
kite  and  its  cord,  with  the  sparks  from  the  key,  and 
the  Ley  den  jar  with  its  similar  sparks.  Franklin's 
"  "Treatise,"  I,  4,  VI. 


54  METHODS 

inferences  that  the  sparks  from  the  key  came  from 
the  storm-cloud,  that  they  were  of  the  same  nature 
as  those  from  the  jar  and  as  the  lightning  flashes, 
and  that  all  of  them  were  caused  by  a  mysterious 
somewhat  called  electricity,  would  by  Hume  be 
denied  all  claim  to  knowledge,  because  they  are  not 
things  which  can  be  perceived,  but  constructions  of 
the  mind.  "The  particular  powers,"  he  says,  "by 
which  all  natural  operations  are  performed  never 
appear  to  the  senses."  I7  "The  understanding  never 
observes  any  real  connection  among  objects."  18  To 
the  natural  inquiry  why  we  all  believe  so  firmly  in 
connections  of  causation  between  objects,  he  replies 
that  it  is  due  to  our  governing  principle  of  habit,  the 
mind  being  "carried  by  habit,  upon  the  appearance 
of  one  event,  to  expect  its  usual  attendant,  and  to 
believe  that  it  will  exist."  19 

This  is  acute  criticism.  Psychologically  it  is  valu- 
able, and  has  had  much  influence  upon  subsequent 
thought.  Logically  it  is  extremely  rigorous,  impeach- 
ing most  of  our  knowledge  of  nature.  It  seems  to  be 
open  to  exception  in  at  least  two  respects:  (1)  Hume 
is  evidently  in  error  hi  declaring  that  relations  are 
never  preceived.  As  Professor  James  has  pointed 
out  w  relations  of  some  kinds — of  space  (local  signs), 
of  tune  (temporal  signs),  of  tendency,  etc., — are  in- 
cluded in  probably  all  our  percepts,  constituting 
what  he  calls  the  "fringe"  of  the  object  as  perceived. 

17  "Enquiry,"  Sec.  5,  Pt.  1. 

«  "Treatise,"  I,  4,  VI. 

»  "Enquiry,"  Sec.  7,  Pt.  2. 

»  "Principles  of  Psychology,"  I,  p.  243  S. 


POSITIVISM  55 

We  cannot  see  an  object  without  perceiving  some- 
thing of  its  position  as  regards  other  objects.  Even 
a  distant  light  surrounded  by  utter  darkness  has  a 
position  relative  to  the  beholder.  (2)  Then,  logically 
the  doctrine  proves  too  much;  for,  if  this  "fringe" 
be  sheared  off,  as  an  illegitimate,  mind-added  ap- 
pendage, it  becomes  impossible  to  find  anything  in 
our  experience  which  answers  to  the  required  descrip- 
tion of  knowledge;  anything,  that  is,  which  is  a  real 
awareness  of  an  object  and  yet  free  from  additions 
due  to  the  mind's  habit  of  being  aware  in  the  present 
so  far  as  possible  in  ways  like  those  of  the  past. 
Where  in  actual  experience  is  the  pure  "impression" 
of  Hume  to  be  found,  the  simple  sensation  devoid  of 
associative  additions?  The  objects  most  likely  to 
answer  to  this  description  would  seem  to  be  the 
seeing  of  an  elementary,  homogeneous  color  or  the 
hearing  of  an  unvarying  sound;  but  careful  intro- 
spection shows  that  in  the  simplest  of  such  experi- 
ences there  are  present  other  elements  than  the  pure 
color  or  sound  sensation.  For  example,  there  is 
quite  sure  to  be  present  a  noting  of  differences  of 
intensity,  and  even  if  none  such  are  discernible,  the 
interest  in  the  search  for  them  is  present,  indicating 
that  the  sensation  is  being  judged  by  more  or  less 
similar  or  contrasted  sensations  in  the  past.  More 
significant  still,  perhaps,  is  the  fact  that  the  nearer 
we  get  our  sensations  to  the  nude  condition  of 
fringelessness,  the  more  the  cognitive,  or  perceptive, 
character  departs  from  them;  and  they  sink  toward 
the  level  of  unconscious  dynamic  reactions,  not  very 
different  perhaps  from  those  of  chemistry.  A  sound, 


56  METHODS 

for  example,  which  does  not  vary  and  is  without 
suggestions  of  interest  easily  sinks  below  the  level  of 
consciousness;  that  is,  we  cease  to  hear  it.  The  logic 
of  Hume's  doctrine  would  thus  require  us  to  identify 
knowledge  with  cerebral  reactions  of  which  we  are 
unaware,  that  is,  know  nothing!  In  the  face  of  such 
a  reductio  ad  dbsurdum  we  must  adopt  a  less  extreme 
view;  we  must,  if  we  are  to  have  any  knowledge  at 
all,  include  in  knowledge  the  results  of  the  mind's 
synthetic  processes  when  these  have  been  carefully 
guarded.  We  must  regard  knowledge,  not  as  a 
simple,  irreducible  datum,  but  as  a  compound  of 
present  experiences  and  revivals  of  and  abstractions 
from  past  experiences.  In  other  words,  as  already 
maintained,21  we  must  recognize  in  it  two,  or  three, 
factors,  namely,  (1)  facts,  or  concrete  items  of  ex- 
perience; (2)  general  ideas  which  the  activity  of  the 
mind,  both  analytic  and  synthetic,  has  derived  from 
previously  known  facts;  and,  in  case  of  need,  (3)  con- 
crete ideas,  such  as  electricity,  which  the  mind  has 
constructed — subject  to  the  law  of  parsimony — for 
the  explanation  of  the  facts. 

With  this  conclusion  we  are  thrown  back  upon  the 
conclusion  that  scientific,  not  philosophic,  positivism, 
is,  so  far  as  it  goes,  the  true  safeguard  of  constructive 
thought;  that  is,  that  facts  are  the  primary  and 
authoritative  elements  in  knowledge,  but  that  the 
mind  may  validly  make  connections  between  the 

M  Cf .  p.  53  f ,  supra.  As  intimated  before  this  division  is  not 
ultimate,  the  psychologist  analyzing  the  facts  also  into  (a)  simple 
psychical  reactions,  or  sensations,  and  (b)  a  complex  mass  of  re- 
vived sensations  which  are  unconsciously  fused  with  the  former. 


POSITIVISM  57 

facts,  and  even  posit  purely  theoretical  existences, 
when  such  additions  to  the  facts  are  required  for 
their  explanation. 


EXERCISES 

1.  Describe  in  detail  five  examples  of  violation  of  the  principle 
of  positivism  in  old-time  scientific  teachings  about  nature.    (The 
first  third  of  A.  D.  White's  small  essay  on  the  "Warfare  of 
Science"  is  one  source  from  which  examples  may  be  drawn). 

2.  Criticise  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  Law  of  Parsimony 
the  confident  conclusions  as  to  the  nature  of  God  of  some  the- 
ologian of  the  traditional  school,  comparing  his  argument  with 
that  of  J.  S.  Mill  in  the  latter's  essay  on  "Theism,"  pt.  2.    (Cf., 
for  example, 

(1)  Wilhelm  and  Scannel  "Manual  of  Catholic  Theology" 

I :  II  :ch.  I,  sees.  56,  57; 

(2)  Charles  Hodge,  "Systematic  Theology"  I:  I,  ch.  5, 

sees.  1  and  4; 

(3)  W.  G.  T.  Shedd,  "Dogmatic  Theology,"  I:  pp.  338-361; 

(4)  Miley,  "Systematic  Theology,"  I,  pp.  161-173.) 

3.  A.  Point  out  in  detail  three  or  more  clear  cases  of  the  fal- 
lacy of  reification  in  ancient  views  as  to  the  origin  of  the  uni- 
verse.    (Cf.  White's  "History  of  the  Warfare  of  Science  with 
Theology,"— the  larger  work— I,  pp.  1-18) 

B.  What  ground  is  there  for  the  claim  of  the  opponents  of 
psychophysical  parallelism  that  the  theory  called  by  that  name 
is  a  case  of  reification?  (Cf .  (1)  Stout's  "  Manual  of  Psychology," 
chap.  3,  and  (2)  Paulsen's  "Introd.  to  Philos."  I,  chap.  I,  sec.  5). 

4.  Make  a  careful  abstract  of  Hume's  "Enquiry  concerning 
the  Human  Understanding,"  sees.   IV  and  V,   bringing  out 
clearly  the  argument  on  which  he  bases  his  philosophical  positiv- 


CHAPTER  IV 
SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY 

We  have  seen  that  the  second  kind  of  knowledge 
material  consists  of  general  ideas,  such  as  inertia, 
and  the  third  of  concrete  ideas,  atoms,  for  example; 
and  that  the  primary  rule  of  sound  knowledge 
building  is  that  these  materials  are  to  be  used  par- 
simoniously. Often,  however,  there  are  two  or  more 
interpretative  ideas  which  may  be  combined  with 
the  facts  to  explain  them.  In  such  cases  how  shall 
we  choose?  When  sea-shells  are  found  in  the  rocks 
on  hill-tops,  shall  we  say  that  their  position  is  due 
to  a  freak  of  nature,  or  to  the  fact  that  those  rocks 
when  in  their  soft,  formative  condition  were  under 
salt  water? 

It  will  be  seen  that  this  question,  what  kind  of 
interpretative  ideas  to  use,  is  of  scarcely  less  import- 
ance than  the  question  how  much  to  use  them;  for 
generalizations  from  past  experience  may  be  useful 
factors  in  constructing  knowledge  in  one  field  and 
yet  be  quite  misleading  in  another.  The  alchemists 
pointed  out  that  the  sunshine  transmutes  hard,  little 
inedible  globes  into  luscious  fruit.  When  they  pro- 
ceeded further  to  argue  that  there  must  be  a  way  of 
transmuting  base  metals  into  silver  and  gold,  since 
the  precious  metals  were  evidently  only  another 

58 


SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY  59 

kind  of  nature's  completed  fruits  while  iron  and 
lead  were  the  same  in  unripe  condition,  they  were 
using  an  idea,  that  of  development,  which  is  sound 
and  useful  in  the  biological  field,  but  which  they  had 
no  reason  to  think  applied  in  the  field  of  metallurgy. 
So,  when  medieval  observers  called  the  sea  fossils 
on  hill-tops  " freaks  of  nature,"  they  were  importing 
into  the  geologic  field  a  principle  (caprice)  drawn 
from  human  conduct,  and  which  appears  to  have  no 
proper  application  there.  Many  illustrations  of  this 
error  might  be  given  from  the  theories  of  natural 
process  set  forth  by  theologians. 

To-day  we  wonder  that  men  of  intellect  in  former 
times  should  have  been  content  with  such  explana- 
tions. How  could  Plato  *  and  Kepler  have  believed 
that  working  secrets,  or  dynamic  keys,  of  nature 
were  to  be  found  in  certain  symmetrical  numbers? 
Unfortunately  it  has  been  much  more  common  to 
disparage  the  science  of  the  past  and  to  stigmatize 
its  explanations  as  artificial,  superstitious,  or  childish2 
than  it  has  been  to  mark  the  precise  point  where 

1  Plato  (427-347  B.  C.)  was  an  eminent  Greek  philosopher,  one 
of  the  three  ancient  metaphysicians  who  have  influenced  the  world 
most,  Democritus  and  Aristotle  being  the  other  two.  He  was  the 
loving  disciple  and  eulogist  of  Socrates,  but  a  man  of  much  greater 
range  of  thought  than  the  latter.  His  influence  is  still  potent  in 
many  ways  in  thinking  men.  He  stands  especially  for  two  great 
convictions:  (1)  the  objective  reality  of  supremely  excellent  (perfect) 
and  external  types  of  existence,  types  which  are  always  drawing 
lower  forms  of  existence  toward  themselves,  and  (2)  the  power  of 
the  human  mind  to  discover  these  supreme  types  by  intellectual 
intuition,  with  a  secondary  aid  on  the  part  of  the  senses.  Aristotle 
was  his  greatest  pupil. 

*  Cf.  Williams,  "Hist,  of  Science,"  I,  p.  294  f;  II,  p.  3  f,  81  f. 


60  METHODS 

old-time  interpreters  left  the  path  of  sound  natural 
inquiry.  That  point  seems  evidently  to  be  the  con- 
fident, and  often  authoritative,  use  of  interpretative  ideas 
that  were  not  drawn  from  the  field  of  the  inquiry  itself; 
that  is,  the  use  of  analogy  which  was  not  scientific, 
because  it  was  imported  without  need  from  another 
department  of  knowledge. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  nature  must  never  be  ex- 
plained by  human  analogies;  but  this  is  too  sweeping 
a  statement,  for,  after  all,  man  and  all  his  activities 
are  parts  of  nature.3  Neither  is  it,  on  the  other  hand 
sufficiently  rigorous;  for  principles  drawn  from  one 
field  of  physical  science  may  not  be  applicable  in 
another.  The  principle  of  friction  appears  to  be 
entirely  valid  in  the  field  of  molar  physics,  but  the 
physicist  is  obliged  to  discard  it  when  he  enters  the 
molecular  domain.  His  best  hypotheses  as  to  mole- 
cules and  atoms  are  brought  to  ruin,  if  he  yields  to 
friction  hi  the  field  of  moving  molecules  the  place 
of  power  which  it  occupies  in  the  field  of  moving 


The  true  rule  is  that  interpretative  ideas  should  be 
relevant;  that  is,  they  must  either  be  drawn  directly 
from  the  field  under  investigation,  or  be  proved  to 
hold  good  there  by  coercive  evidence.4  Thus,  it 
was  an  entirely  legitimate  process  of  thought  when 
the  idea  of  evolution  was  used  to  account  for  the 
origin  of  species.  Evolution,  that  is,  development 

8  It  is  not  improper,  for  example,  to  interpret  animal  intelligence 
by  human  when  proper  allowances  are  made. 

4  This  seems  to  be  what  Whewell  had  in  mind  in  a  partial  way  in 
maintaining  that  interpretative  ideas  should  be  "appropriate  to  the 
facts." — "Inductive  Sciences,"  I,  p.  81. 


SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY  61 

dominated  by  heredity  but  with  modifications, 
was  known  to  obtain  in  the  organic  field  among 
individuals;  all  living  things  grow  (i.  e.  develop) 
in  typical  ways;  and  so  it  might  well  effect  the  racial 
type,  also.  It  is  a  much  more  dubious  matter  when 
the  evolutionary  idea  is  applied  to  the  changes  which 
have  taken  place  in  the  earth  and  the  solar  system. 
Again,  a  wall  of  stone  found  in  a  newly  discovered 
land  might  properly  be  explained  as  the  remnant  of 
a  dwelling,  a  storehouse,  or  a  fort,  as  the  case  might 
be,  if  the  parts  were  so  shaped  and  fitted  together 
as  to  indicate  human  construction;  but  such  an 
explanation  would  be  inadmissible  if  neither  in  it 
nor  in  other  parts  of  the  country  were  there  good 
indications  of  human  agency.  It  would  not  even 
be  permissible,  supposing  the  wall  actually  to  serve 
as  a  barrier  against  the  encroachments  of  the  sea, 
to  conclude  that  nature  erected  it  for  that  purpose; 
for  the  whole  idea  of  shaping  objects  to  serve  certain 
foreseen  ends  (teleology)  is  one  that  is  derived  from 
human — and  possibly  organic — processes,  not  from 
what  goes  on  in  the  inorganic  world.  Most  of  the 
older  teleogical  arguments  of  theological  apologists 
violate  this  principle.  When  it  is  said  that  the 
shape  of  a  horse's  mouth  shows  that  the  animal 
was  designed  to  be  subject  to  the  bit,  an  inter- 
pretative idea  drawn,  not  from  biology  as  it  should 
be,  but  from  human  civilizing  activities  is  trans- 
ferred to  a  field  where  it  has  no  accredited  standing. 
Before  such  an  interpretation  could  be  accepted,  it 
would  have  to  be  shown  by  adequate  proofs  that 
(1)  organic  processes  work  toward  foreseen  ends, 


62  METHODS 

and  (2)  that  the  subjection  of  the  lower  animals  to 
human  uses  was  one  of  those  foreseen  ends.6 

It  may  be  objected,  that  when  investigation 
enters  upon  a  new  field,  it  is  impossible  to  interpret 
the  new  phenomena  by  ideas  drawn  from  it,  for  such 
ideas  cannot  exist  until  it  is  better  known.  Such, 
not  long  since,  was  the  case  as  regards  electricity. 
It  was  called  a  fluid,  using  an  idea  drawn  from  the 
field  of  hydraulics,  because  that  was  the  conception 
which  seemed  most  likely  to  throw  light  on  the  new 
phenomena.  The  exception  is  well  taken;  science 
does  indeed  often  have  to  work  with  ideas  of  uncer- 
tain applicability.  The  investigator,  however,  has 
learned  to  observe  the  spirit  of  the  principle  under 
discussion,  even  when  he  departs  from  the  letter  of 
it;  for  he  is  careful  to  treat  such  borrowed  ideas 
tentatively,  and  to  regard  them  as  symbolic,  that  is, 
as  standing  for  an  order  of  things  largely  unknown, 
but,  as  he  hopes,  soon  to  be  discovered.  So  used, 
that  is,  in  an  essentially  experimental  way,  or  as 
working  hypotheses,  ideas  may  be  transferred  to 
new  fields  with  profit;  for  then  they  are  applied  no 
further  than  their  actual  service  justifies,  and  their 
application  is  a  flexible  one  through  which  they  be- 
come more  and  more  modified  as  the  new  phenomena 
are  brought  to  light.  Indeed,  any  idea  whatever, 
even  the  most  anthropomorphic,  may  legitimately  be 
utilized,  if  it  works,  provided  it  is  applied  sugges- 

6  Of.  Hegel's  denial  that  the  fact  that  corks  make  good  stoppers 
for  bottles  is  proof  that  the  cork  tree  exists  to  serve  that  end.  The 
teleology  referred  to  above  is  the  traditional  sort.  That  there  may 
be  a  sound  teleology  is  not  disputed. 


SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY  63 

lively  and  not  dogmatically,  that  is,  as  a  possible  not 
a  binding  interpretation,  as  a  hypothesis  not  a  law. 
These  concessions  do  not  do  away  with  the  prin- 
ciple of  relevant  interpretation  itself,  for  in  the  com- 
petition of  hypotheses  those  are  always  to  be  pre- 
ferred which  seem  to  be  most  germane  to  the  field 
so  far  as  it  is  known;  and  more  and  more  with  the 
advance  of  discovery  does  it  always  become  clear 
what  general  principles  belong  to  that  field,  and  what 
are  to  be  challenged  when  brought  to  its  borders. 
The  fallacy  of  irrelevant  interpretation,  or  im- 
ported principle,  is,  of  course,  not  confined  to  the 
theologians.  Physicists,  when  they  get  over  the 
border  into  philosophy,  are  perhaps  as  liable  to  it 
as  any.  The  age-long  insistence  that  the  true  key 
to  the  universe  is  the  principle  of  inertia,  taken  in 
its  original  sense  of  powerlessness,  is  a  case  in  point. 
Inertia,  or  rather  inertness,  is  no  doubt  a  very  use- 
ful principle  in  the  domain  of  mechanics,  whether 
human  or  natural;  and  it  serves  well  the  purposes  of 
that  science  which  is  so  largely  made  up  of  abstrac- 
tions from  mechanics — mathematics.  But  when,  as 
has  been  done  times  without  number  by  a  natural 
but  not  logical  consequence,  the  attempt  has  been 
made  to  apply  it  in  a  sovereign  way  to  the  whole  of 
existence,  and  to  establish  the  amazing  proposition 
that  this  living,  pulsating,  growing  world  is  merely 
a  continually  shifting  series  of  geometrical  groupings 
of  inert  (dead)  elements — things  which  do  nothing 
whatever,  except  as  they  are  made  to  do  them,  and 
yet  which  are  subject  to  no  reagents  to  make  them 
do  anything  except  each  other! — then  we  have  un- 


64  METHODS 

scientific  analogy  invading  the  field  of  molecular 
physics.  Such  a  staggering  conception  would,  of 
course,  never  have  gained  its  long  hold  on  philosophic 
thought  but  for  the  strong  impression  of  inertness 
made  upon  us  by  ordinary  inorganic  masses;  but 
scientifically  that  is  no  sufficient  reason  for  enthroning 
inertness  in  quite  different  fields,  either  in  the  organic 
realm  on  the  one  side,  or  on  the  other  in  the  molecular, 
where  masses  are  secondary,  not  primary. 

Scientific  analogy  is  then  a  principle  of  rigor  in 
thought  constructions.  Its  purpose  is  to  shut  out 
misleading  forms  of  synthetic  thought.  It  requires 
that,  whenever  possible,  phenomena  shall  be  ex- 
plained by  ideas  known  to  prevail  in  their  own  fields; 
and  that,  when  these  are  not  available,  ideas  bor- 
rowed from  other  fields  shall  be  used  cautiously  and 
symbolically,  pains  being  taken  to  modify  them  in 
their  new  application  as  the  facts  may  require. 

Agreement. — Another  application  of  the  principle 
of  rigor  is  the  familiar  logical  test  of  agreement 
negatively  applied.  No  would-be  law  or  other  con- 
struction of  experience,  can  be  accepted  unless,  (1) 
it  agrees  with  itself — is  self-consistent, — unless  (2) 
it  agrees  with  the  facts  in  an  all-round  way  better 
than  any  other  interpretation,  and  unless  (3)  it 
agrees  with  the  accredited  truth  already  in  possession. 
It  must  be  confessed,  however,  that  this  third  de- 
mand is  not  absolute.  A  new  interpretation  some- 
times prevails  notwithstanding  it  conflicts  with 
accepted  principles.  In  such  (essentially  revolu- 
tionary) cases  it  yields  a  more  complete  understanding 
of  the  whole  wide  field,  and  in  consequence  displaces 


SCIENTIFIC  ANALOGY  65 

the  older  views.  Such  was  the  case  when  the  Coperni- 
can  astronomy  displaced  the  Ptolemaic,  and  when 
Darwinian  evolution  displaced  special  creationism. 
Descartes'  First  Rule. — Still  another  sound  rule 
of  rigor  is  embodied  in  the  resolve  made  by  Des- 
cartes, "Never  to  accept  anything  for  true  that  I 
did  not  clearly  know  to  be  such,  .  .  .  and  to  com- 
prise nothing  more  in  my  judgment  than  what  was 
presented  to  my  mind  so  clearly  and  distinctly  as  to 
exclude  all  ground  for  doubt."  He  was  led  to  frame 
this  rule  by  discontent  with  the  teachings  he  had 
received  in  the  ecclesiastical  schools.  "I  thought," 
he  tells  us,  "that  I  could  not  do  better  than  resolve 
at  once  to  sweep  them  wholly  away,  that  I  might 
afterwards  be  in  a  position  to  admit  others  more 
correct,  or  even  perhaps  the  same  when  they  had 
undergone  the  scrutiny  of  reason."  To  his  mind, 
with  its  large  mathematical  powers  and  strong 
interest  in  mechanics,  the  cardinal  error  of  the 
scholastic  teaching  was  its  disposition  to  posit 
things  of  which  neither  could  a  definite  image  be 
formed  nor  binding  logical  relationship  be  affirmed. 
In  reaction  from  such  indistinct  and  unreal  concep- 
tions, he  adopted  the  rule  quoted  above.  The 
significance  of  his  principle  on  its  positive  side 
will  be  considered  in  the  next  chapter.  On  its 
negative,  or  rigorous,  side  it  is  a  sound  and  valuable 
methodological  principle,  one  which  to-day  is  in- 
stinctively followed  in  all  inquiries  which  deserve 
to  be  called  scientific.  Its  effect  is  to  exclude  in- 
terpretations that  are  vague,  undefined,  and  beyond 
analytical  inquiry  and  verification.  A  very  large 


66  METHODS 

part  of  the  erroneous  thinking  of  the  world  is  obscure 
thinking,  its  objects  appearing  as  through  a  mist, 
and  the  relations  between  them  at  various  points 
failing  to  appear  at  all.  To  obviate  this  source  of 
error  Descartes'  first  rule  demands  that  conceptional 
candidates  for  approval  and  adoption — that  is, 
logical  constructions — shall  come  out  into  the  light 
where  they  may  be  scrutinized. 


EXERCISES 

1.  Make  an  abstract  of  one  of  the  older  standard  teleologies! 
arguments,  and  point  out  in  detail  the  difficulty  that  scientific 
thought  finds  in  them.     (Cf.,  for  example,  (1)  Paley,  "Natural 
Theology,"  chaps.  1-3; 

(2)  McCosh  and  Dickie,  "Typical  Forms,  etc.  in  Creation," 

I,  chap.  2,  sec.  3; 

(3)  Kirby,  Seventh  Bridgewater  Treatise,  chap.  3.) 

2.  In  connection  with  the  many  efforts  that  have  been  made 
to  explain  gravitation  by  means  of  the  pressure  or  impacts  of 
some  external  substance  on  the  material  molecules — that  is, 
by  means  of  the  familiar  mechanical  processes  of  masses  of 
matter — show  how  the  principle  of  scientific  analogy  is  disre- 
garded. 

3.  Show  how  materialistic  writers  in  their  teachings  regarding 
mental  phenomena  at  times  use  unscientific  analogy.     (Cf.,  for 
example, 

(1)  D'Holbach,  "System  of  Nature,"  chaps.  2  and  9; 

(2)  Lange,    "History   of    Materialism,"    II,    pp.    97-100; 

(3)  Paulsen,  "Introd.  to  Philos.",  I,  chap.  I,  sec.  4.) 


CHAPTER  V 
CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH 

The  various  principles  mentioned  so  far,  from 
positivism  to  clearness,  are  all  principles  of  rigor, 
tests  of  truth  in  a  negative  way.  Their  main  purpose 
is  to  show  what  kinds  of  mental  synthesis  are  not 
trustworthy.  When  we  ask  for  positive  tests — 
criteria  for  deciding  what  constructions  may  and 
should  be  accepted — the  answers  are  much  less  con- 
fident. 

How,  for  example,  should  we  regard  the  electronic 
theory  of  matter?  A  recent  advocate  of  it  tells  us 
that  it  "accounts  for  static  electricity,  current 
electricity,  magnetism,  the  radiations  of  light, 
X-rays,  etc.,  inertia,  chemical  action,  the  atoms  of 
matter  and  their  peculiar  properties  as  exemplified 
in  the  periodic  law,  and  the  phenomena  of  radio- 
activity." l  Moreover,  "the  whole  mass  of  matter 
may  be  accounted  for  on  the  supposition  that  it  is 
electrical  in  origin."  That  is,  the  theory  agrees  on  a 
remarkably  wide  scale  with  the  facts  of  physics. 
Does  he  therefore  claim  that  it  is  proved?  On  the 
contrary,  he  confesses  that  it  is  not  proved;  and 
adds  that  "the  acceptability  of  the  hypothesis  de- 
pends on  the  extent  of  its  exclusive  power  to  account 
for  things;  the  more  exclusive  it  becomes  the  more 
1  R.  K.  Duncan,  "The  New  Knowledge,"  p.  187  f. 
67 


68  METHODS 

we  shall  believe  it."  (Italics  mine.)  Its  chief  short- 
coming he  finds  to  be  the  fact  that,  "there  are 
phenomena  which  the  theory  does  not  yet  explain," 
positive  electricity,  for  example.  Nor  does  it  account 
for  gravitation,  still  less  for  life  and  mind. 

It  appears  from  this  (representative)  example, 
that  (1)  on  the  positive  side,  a  widespread  and 
superior  agreement  with  the  facts  is  sufficient  ground 
for  accepting  an  interpretative  idea  as  a  hypothesis, 
but  not  as  a  law  or  established  truth.  Furthermore, 
(2)  "the  more  exclusive  it  becomes"  in  its  power  to 
account  for  things,  that  is,  the  more  the  facts  seem  to 
require  it,  the  greater  our  rightful  confidence  in  it. 
In  this  way  the  hypothesis  becomes  converted  into 
an  accepted  theory,  as  was  the  case  with  the  idea  of 
evolution  in  biology.  In  such  cases  we  may  say  that 
the  factor  of  necessity,  emphasized  in  the  law  of  parsi- 
mony, has  come  in  to  reinforce  that  of  agreement. 

Not  even  yet,  however,  do  we  reach  scientific 
certainty;  for  just  as  agreement  alone  yields  only 
probability,  since  there  may  be  unknown  factors 
which  will  not  fit  into  the  hypothesis,  so  necessity 
(of  this  sort)  yields  only  a  higher  degree  of  probabil- 
ity. It  still  remains  possible  that  the  demand  of  the 
facts  for  the  explanation  in  question  may  disappear 
with  fuller  knowledge.  The  luminiferous  ether — a 
universal  somewhat  that  is  weightless,  frictionless, 
and  yet  rigid  (a  quasi-solid) — is  a  theoretical  entity 
which  has  long  been  accepted  on  the  ground  of 
necessity;  but  to-day  physicists  are  beginning  to 
regard  it  with  suspicion. 

(3)  Experimental  verification  is,  of  course,  an  es- 


CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH  69 

tablished  test  of  truth,  and  the  only  one  which  is 
acknowledged  to  have  power  to  yield  scientific  cer- 
tainty. Familiar  as  this  fact  is,  the  nature  of  the 
"certainty"  it  furnishes  is  often  misunderstood. 
That  certainty  is  not  properly  demonstrative,  but 
practical.  That  is,  it  leads  to  the  conviction  that 
certain  things  (relations  and  results)  are  so;  it  does 
not  make  it  evident  that  they  must  be  so,  that 
nothing  else  would  be  conceivable.  In  ordinary 
induction  we  first  form  a  generalization  or  hypothesis 
which  agrees  with  all  the  facts  so  far  as  known. 
Next  we  deduce  from  it  new  results  which  should 
appear  under  suitable  conditions.  Finally  we  supply 
the  conditions,  and  if  the  expected  new  phenomena 
are  forthcoming,  we  count  the  hypothesis  true. 
But  why?  Just  because  it  works;  the  things  which 
it  says  nature  will  do  for  us  are  actually  done  for  us 
by  nature.  It  is  a  prediction  which  comes  true.  It 
is  a  fruitful  conception,  an  interpretation  which 
leads  to  new  discoveries,  that  is,  to  new  experience 
of  the  kind  required  by  the  interpretation;  therefore 
it  is  a  truth.2  Now,  the  nature  of  truth  is  sharply 

*  This  test  is  sometimes  challenged  as  not  conclusive.  It  is  urged 
that  erroneous  theories  may  lead  to  new  discoveries.  The  single 
and  the  double-fluid  theories  of  electricity  cannot  both  be  true; 
yet  they  have  both  proved  fruitful  in  the  way  of  new  discovery. 
The  criticism  seems  to  apply  only  to  loose  statements  of  the  test 
under  discussion.  Newly  discovered  phenomena  do  not  establish  a 
hypothesis  unless  they  are  suggested  and  logically  required  by  it. 
Any  hypothesis  acted  upon  will  lead  to  some  land  of  discovery, 
generally  to  the  discovery  that  the  hypothesis  is  wrong.  Further- 
more, in  most  hypotheses  there  is  a  considerable  symbolic  element, 
which  is  a  useful  vehicle  for  thought,  but  is  negligible  in  actual 
thought  constructions.  Thus  the  Alexandrian  astronomers,  in 


70  METHODS 

debated  in  philosophy,  but  for  the  average  man  of 
science  it  seems  to  be  substantially  those  concep- 
tions, or  mental  constructions,  which  enable  him  to 
predict  what  will  happen  in  nature,  and,  within  the 
limits  of  human  powers,  to  control  those  happenings. 
Such  conceptions  are  evidently  the  kind  just  out- 
lined, the  kind  which  experimental  verification  shows 
will  work. 

(4)  To  some  minds,  probably,  there  is  a  further 
reason  than  that  of  agreement  for  accepting  the 
electronic  hypothesis;  it  offers  the  kind  of  funda- 
mental situation  which  to  them  seems  likely.  From 
the  point  of  view  of  their  intimate  knowledge  of 
nature,  there  is  something  self-evident  in  the  very 
notion.  This  sort  of  ground  of  belief  seems  to  have 
been  Descartes'  chief  reliance,  when  principles  and 
not  facts  were  in  question.  In  his  discontent  with  the 
vague,  inconclusive  thinking  of  his  time,  he  resorted  to 
a  provisional  skepticism,  and  challenged  all  the  con- 
tents of  his  mind.  The  result  was  that  only  one 
phenomenon  appeared  to  be  indubitable,  namely, 
consciousness.  That  could  not  be  doubted,  for  the 

utilizing  the  notion  of  hollow  celestial  spheres  did  not  mean  to 
commit  themselves  to  a  posit  of  these  as  literal  physical  existences; 
they  meant  only  to  affirm  that  the  moon  and  planets  move  as  if  set 
'in  such  celestial  spheres.  So  of  the  two  theories  of  electricity;  they 
are  contradictory  only  when  the  symbolic  term  "fluid"  is  empha- 
sized. If  reference  is  confined  to  that  term,  however,  the  two-fluid 
theory  has  not  led  to  new  discovery.  The  two-fluid  theory  has  led 
to  new  discovery  only  as  its  distinctive  term  has  been  taken  as  a 
symbol  of  the  idea  of  activities  proceeding  from  both  poles,  and  in 
so  far  it  certainly  seems  to  be  true.  Nor  does  it  at  all  appear  how 
it  can  fail  to  be  true  just  so  far  as  the  actual  fruits  of  discovery 
are  what  it  explicitly  points  to  and  requires. 


CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH  71 

very  doubt  was  a  form  of  consciousness.  Thinking 
certainly  went  on,  for  the  very  inquiry  in  which  he 
was  engaged  was  thinking.  Yet  on  close  scrutiny 
the  only  reason  why  he  was  sure  of  the  existence  of 
consciousness  appeared  to  be  that  it  confronted  him 
with  such  clearness  and  distinctness  that  he  was 
forced  to  accept  it  as  actual.  From  this  he  concluded, 
rather  sweepingly,  that  he  "  might  take  as  a  general 
rule  the  principle  that  all  things  which  we  very 
clearly  and  distinctly  conceive  are  true."  3 

It  is  evident  that  he  felt — and  in  this  respect  he 
was  again  a  genuine  representative  of  modern 
science — that  a  law  to  be  accepted  as  such  should 
impress  itself  upon  the  mind  by  means  of  a  certain 
coercive  or  self-evident  character  of  its  own,  and 
that  this  inherent  coerciveness  was  to  be  secured  by 
a  kind  of  inner  immediate  perception,  or  intellectual 
intuition.4  Since  Hume's  day 5  this  sort  of  process 
has  been  extensively  impeached;  and  certainly  in 

»  "Method,"  Pt.  IV.  It  should  be  noted  that  in  this  famous  rule 
Descartes  uses  the  word  conceive  not  perceive.  He  refers  to  objects 
of  thought — principles,  etc. — which  appear  to  the  mind  in  this 
distinct,  self-evident  way.  Objects  of  sense  were  not  regarded  by 
him  as  ever  presenting  themselves  in  this  way.  Hence  Jevons 
("Lessons  in  Logic,"  p.  229)  is  wide  of  the  mark  in  his  objection 
that  clear  and  distinct  conception  of  gold  mountains  is  no  guarantee 
of  their  existence. 

4  The  Greek  thinkers  generally  had  this  view.  They  distinguished 
sharply  between  knowledge  and  opinion,  the  latter  being  mere  gen- 
eralizations (mostly  uncritical)  from  sensory  experience.  Knowl- 
edge, on  the  contrary,  was  the  result  of  the  immediate  insight  of 
reason,  and  was  of  far  higher  validity.  Knowledge  so  denned  was 
the  end  of  inquiry  for  the  philosopher,  and  the  possession  of  it  was 
bis  peculiar  prerogative. 

«  Cf .  p.  52  f .  supra. 


72  METHODS 

the  more  complex  cases,  and  especially  in  natural 
situations,  clear  and  distinct  perception  of  an  alleged 
law  or  principle  has  not  been  found  sufficient  warrant 
of  its  truth.  Thus  it  was  long  perfectly  obvious  to 
men — probably  is  so  still  to  most  of  them — that  all 
solid  objects  tend  to  move  downward  in  an  absolute 
sense,  their  courses  being  parallel;  but  the  notion 
is  erroneous  none  the  less.  The  actual  tendency  is 
expressed  by  Newton's  law  of  gravitation.  Des- 
cartes himself,  immediately  after  concluding  to  trust 
the  clear  and  distinct,  proceeds  to  construct  a  demon- 
stration of  the  existence  of  God  along  such  lines, 
which  probably  no  man  of  science  as  such  would 
to-day  accept. 

On  the  other  hand,  immediate  awareness  is  un- 
questionably the  basis  of  all  knowledge.  All  sense 
perception,  for  example,  is  essentially  intuitive.  Its 
objects  simply  are  what  they  are,  and  nothing  more 
fundamental  can  be  adduced  to  prove  them,  though 
they  may  be  interpreted  and  modified  by  comparison 
with  one  another.  The  simpler  relations  between 
things,  too,  appear  to  be  immediately  given.6  Axioms 
and  certain  mathematical  situations  seem  to  be 
matters  of  immediate  knowledge.  Descartes  no 
doubt  went  too  far  in  holding  that  intuition  of  com- 
plex relations,  such  as  laws  and  systems,  is  sufficient 
evidence  of  their  truth;  yet  it  would  seem  that  in 
this  positive  application  of  his  first  rule  he  has 
seized  upon  one  actual,  if  not  the  supreme,  criterion 
of  truth — a  certain  self-evidence  which  even  complex 
relations  and  systems  often  present  to  the  clear 

6  Cf.  p.  54,  supra. 


CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH  73 

analytic  insight  of  the  trained  observer  of  nature. 
Men  who  gain  an  intimate  acquaintance  with 
natural  agencies — as  was  the  case  with  Descartes 
himself — seem  to  acquire  a  habit  of  thinking  in 
accord  with  natural  processes,  so  that  a  proposed 
new  interpretation,  the  moment  it  is  made  analytic- 
ally clear,  awakens  in  them  a  response,  either  of 
approval  or  denial,  according  as  it  agrees  or  dis- 
agrees with  the  kind  of  psychic  movement  to  which 
nature  has  accustomed  them.  The  judgment  in 
such  cases  seems  to  be  of  essentially  the  same  kind 
as  that  of  any  expert. 

The  Absolute  and  the  Pragmatic. — Descartes' 
intuitive  criterion  of  truth  is  not  alone  in  coming 
short  of  certainty.  Even  the  experimental  test 
shares  that  shortcoming,  though  hardly  to  the  same 
degree.  It  is  always  possible  that  deeper  inquiry 
will  show  that  the  accepted  principle  does  not 
"work"  so  well  or  so  widely  as  it  seemed  to.  Indeed, 
the  objection  is  a  pertinent  one,  that  none  of  the 
critical  tests  offered  lead  to  certainty,  or  indeed,  to 
real  knowledge.  The  principle  of  exclusive  agree- 
ment, or  necessity,  for  example,  useful  as  it  is,  is 
only  a  makeshift  as  a  test  of  logical  construction. 
It  never  warrants  us  in  thinking  that  we  have  reached 
absolute  truth;  for  the  interpretation  which  seems 
necessary,  and  is  therefore  accounted  true,  in  the 
present  generation,  may,  hi  days  to  come,  be  dis- 
missed as  quite  needless.  It  is  thus  a  principle 
which  calls  for  endless  correction  of  its  results. 
Moreover,  it  admits  of  large  differences  of  individual 
opinion  hi  the  present,  since  there  is  no  agreement, 


74  METHODS 

and  can  be  none,  as  to  what  interpretations  are 
"necessary."  So  of  the  other  criteria  of  truth;  they 
are  mere  means  of  approximating  truth,  which  itself 
in  the  absolute  sense  is  never  reached. 

These  criticisms  are  quite  just  in  their  way.  The 
answer  is  that  science  has  found  it  quite  possible, 
and  not  inconvenient,  to  attain  to  increasing  knowl- 
edge and  control  of  nature  without  troubling  itself 
about  absolute  truth  at  all.  The  truth  which  meets 
its  tests  to-day  is  sufficient  for  its  needs  to-day.  If 
to-morrow's  larger  truth  put  a  new  and  perhaps  in 
some  respects  condemnatory  aspect  upon  to-day's 
interpretations,  why  sufficient  still,  no  doubt,  will 
that  larger  truth  be  to  the  day  thereof. 

The  objection  just  stated  brings  before  us  a  radical 
difference  in  philosophic  interest  and  outlook  on  the 
part  of  thinking  men.  For  the  philosopher  of  ab- 
solutist tendencies  the  goal  of  all  inquiry  is  ac- 
quaintance— a  quasi-photographic  acquaintance — 
with  things  as  they  are  and  always  were,  and  always 
will  be;  for  he  assumes,  with  the  Eleatic  philosophers 
of  the  fifth  century,  B.  c.,  that  the  ultimate  bases  of 
existence  are  changeless.  Only  such  acquaintance 
does  he  recognize  as  knowledge.  Other  constructions 
may  be  valid,  that  is,  may  work,  but  they  are  not 
true.  On  the  other  hand,  men  of  science,  whatever 
be  their  private  philosophies,  are  content  in  their 
several  fields  of  research  to  regard  knowledge  as  an 
approximation  to  actuality,  and  all  their  efforts  are 
bent  to  the  task  of  making  that  approximation 
fuller  and  closer.  They  recognize  that  the  work  of 
science  has  always  been  with  the  partial,  the  approxi- 


CRITERIA  OF  TRUTH  75 

mate,  the  relative,  and,  seeing  no  occasion  for  shame 
over  its  progress  hitherto,  they  harbor  no  fear  for 
the  future,  should  the  approximate  still  continue  to 
be  its  lot. 

Not  a  few  thoughtful  men  to-day  go  further;  they 
challenge  the  traditional  static  assumptions  as  to 
existence,  and  show  a  disposition  to  regard  even  the 
most  fixed  and  rigid  types  of  substance  and  law  as 
only  relatively  changeless.  It  is  to  them  quite  a 
reasonable  hypothesis  that  both  substances  and  their 
established  forms  of  activity  are  the  attainments 
slowly  reached  through  the  ages  of  an  order  of  exist- 
ence which  in  the  remote  past  was  more  or  less  un- 
determined— a  process  of  continuous  creation,  in 
fact,  which  is  still  going  on.  For  the  absolutist,  on 
the  other  hand,  there  never  was  any  creation,  unless 
we  are  pleased  to  call  by  that  name  some  of  the 
infinite  series  of  unfoldings  of  the  eternal  Absolute 
Existence  or  Substance.  This  radical  difference  in 
outlook  doubtless  roots  in  that  fundamental  differ- 
ence in  scientific  interest  described  hi  the  first 
chapter,  the  main  interest  of  the  absolutist  being  the 
contemplation  of  nature,  while  that  of  the  type  of 
philosopher  just  referred  to  is  the  use  of  natural 
facts  and  laws  for  progressive  purposes  of  thought 
and  life.  The  latter  interest  is  properly  called  prag- 
matic when  that  word  is  taken  in  its  broader  sense. 

EXERCISES 

1.  It  is  a  generally  accepted  theory  of  psychologists  that  there 
is  no  psychosis  without  a  neurosis;  that  is,  mental  phenomena 
occur  only  in  connection  with  some  neural  process.  Show  in 


76  METHODS 

what  various  ways  this  principle  should  be  tested  before  it  is 
admitted  to  the  rank  of  a  natural  law. 

2.  Show  in  detail  how  the  various  criteria  of  truth  are  applied 
in  the  discussions  of 

(1)  Darwin  on  "The  Structure  of  Coral  Reefs,"  chap.  V; 
and  of  (2) Huxley  on  "Biogenesis."  (Cf.  "Discourses,  Biological, 
etc.,"  lee.  VIII). 


PART  II 
RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 


CHAPTER  VI 
MATTER— QUANTITY 

In  turning  from  Methodological  to  Empirical 
Principles,  that  is,  from  the  thought  methods  to  the 
thought  results  of  science,  only  the  major  empirical 
principles  can  be  discussed.  Our  concern  will  neces- 
sarily be  simply  with  those  large  working  concepts 
(ideas)  which  present-day  science  is  continually 
using  in  its  mental  constructions.  To  consider 
scientific  thought  results  in  general  would  require  a 
treatise,  if  not  a  library.  Of  course,  our  guiding  in- 
quiry from  now  on  will  no  longer  be,  How  do  we 
know  that  certain  things  are  true,  but  rather,  What 
things  does  science  hold  to  be  true? 

Material  Things  the  Original  Subject-Matter  of 
Science. — It  might  well  be  very  instructive  if  we 
could  divest  our  thoughts  of  all  the  empirical  teach- 
ings of  science,  and,  looking  at  nature  with  the  fresh 
vision  of  the  child  or  of  primitive  man,  note  which  of 
her  parts  or  aspects  appealed  to  us  first  and  most 
strongly.  It  is  scarcely  possible,  however,  thus  to 
put  ourselves  as  observers  outside  the  body  of  teach- 
ings which  have  entered  into  our  make-up  as  ob- 
servers. That  would  be  in  a  sense  to  put  ourselves 
outside  of  ourselves.  But  much  the  same  point  of 
view  can  be  gained  by  noting  the  objects  which 
79 


80    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

attracted  the  attention  of  the  earliest  scientific  in- 
quirers. These  beyond  doubt,  were  the  features  of 
the  external,  or  material,  world,  the  things  which 
appeal  to  the  outer  senses.  It  was  not  because  these 
things  were  nearest  to  man;  for  generally  they  are 
not  so  close  and  vivid  as  his  feelings  of  pleasure  and 
pain  and  his  emotional  experiences;  but  they  are 
more  clearly  denned,  and  at  the  same  time  more 
stable,  and  so  more  open  to  inquiry.  An  emotion  be- 
gins to  vanish  the  moment  we  scrutinize  it,  but  a 
stone  or  a  star  persists  in  its  characteristics  however 
long  it  is  inspected.  These  relatively  definite,  stable 
objects  known  to  us  through  our  outer  senses — what 
we  call  material  things,  or  physical  objects — still 
constitute  the  subject-matter  of  physical  science. 

The  Phenomena  of  Change  the  First  Problem  of 
Science. — In  discussing  the  motives  of  science  l  the 
remark  was  made  that  to  many  minds  the  world  is  a 
drama — something  of  absorbing  interest  to  be 
watched.  Now,  in  a  drama  the  interest  centers  on 
the  movement,  and  especially  the  development.  It 
was  evidently  this  aspect  of  movement,  the  changeful 
features  of  nature, — its  continual  transformations, 
and  birth  and  growth  and  death — which  appealed 
chiefly  to  the  first  men  of  science.  Nor  is  it  strange 
that  it  was  so.  All  animals,  man  included,  maintain 
their  life  and  well-being  through  a  continuous  ad- 
justment of  themselves  to  their  environment.  To 
do  this  it  is  needful  that  they  be  quick  to  discern 
changes  in  that  environment.  It  was  under  the 
pressure  of  this  need  apparently  that  the  knowing 

1  Cf .  p.  16,  supra. 


MATTER  81 

faculties  were  developed.  Quite  naturally,  therefore, 
an  animal's  attention  is  most  readily  caught  and 
held  by  the  changes  going  on  about  it.  A  lack  of 
attention  to  them  may  cost  it  its  food,  its  limbs,  or 
its  life.  When  man  came  to  the  stage  of  reflective, 
or  scientific,  interest  it  was  but  a  natural  continuation 
of  his  biological  habit  that  he  should  give  attention 
to  the  changeful  rather  than  the  static.  How  did 
water  come  from  the  air  and  ice  from  water?  Why 
did  fire  spring  out  of  the  wood?  Especially  was  con- 
structive change,  the  process  of  becoming  or  develop- 
ment, the  object  of  his  curiosity.  How  did  the  seed 
build  itself  up  into  the  plant  and  the  tree?  How  did 
the  egg  transform  itself  into  the  bird? 

Prescientific  thought  accounted  for  these  phenom- 
ena animistically,  that  is,  by  the  hypothesis  of  an 
invisible  soul  or  spirit  residing  in  the  objects  and 
working  the  transformations.  It  was  not  an  absurd 
hypothesis,  odd  as  it  seems  to  us  to-day;  for  we  are 
aware  of  invisible,  and  to  our  fellows  altogether  im- 
perceptible, changes  within  ourselves  which  lead  to 
great  changes  in  our  conduct;  but  it  has  not  justified 
itself  in  subsequent  inquiry.  A  truly  scientific  begin- 
ning was  made,  and  scientific  inquiry  may  be  said 
to  have  commenced,  when  men  began  to  explain 
natural  changes  by  means  of  more  familiar  objects 
and  changes  in  nature  itself.  Of  such  a  type  of  in- 
quiry was  the  question  of  the  first  philosophers  of 
Greece  as  to  what  was,  and  is,  the  original  element 
or  mother-stuff  of  the  world.  Their  answers  were 
naturally  crude  at  first.  Thales  (600  B.  c.)  thought 
it  was  water;  Anaximenes  held  that  it  was  air.  The 


82    RESULTS—EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

great  error  of  these  men  and  their  fellows  lay  in  the 
notion — a  heritage  from  animism — that  the  under- 
lying substance  of  the  world  alters  its  inherent  nature 
when  it  passes  from  one  material  form  to  a  different 
one,  much  as  a  human  mind  seems  to  change  in  pass- 
ing from  one  state  to  another.  This  is  a  magical  and 
not  a  scientific  conception;  for,  if  existence  can  thus 
metamorphose  itself  through  and  through  in  a  mo- 
ment, there  is  no  rational  ground  for  the  universal 
statements  of  science,  and  especially  for  the  principle 
of  uniformity.  Anything  may  become  anything 
else,  however  different  from  the  former  thing;  and 
we  can  conceive  of  no  reason  why  in  the  same  cir- 
cumstances the  second  thing  should  act  like  the  first. 

Yet  most  surprising  metamorphoses  do  occur  in 
nature.  When  the  ancient  Roman  burned  faggots 
on  his  hearth,  the  greater  part  of  then*  substance  did 
disappear  mysteriously  before  his  eyes,  and  the  whole 
of  it  was  transformed.  To  an  ignorant  but  thought- 
ful mind  it  is  not  strange  that  there  seemed  to  be 
something  divine  in  the  process.  Whither  had  the 
solid  wood  gone?  Up  to  heaven,  seemed  to  be  the 
answer  of  the  ascending  smoke,  itself  suggesting 
the  clustering  ghosts  of  the  vanishing  faggots.  The 
world  is  full  of  such  transformations;  how  shall  we 
explain  them?  Is  there  no  fundamental  change  of 
nature  or  essence  in  them? 

Physical  Objects  Constant  in  Nature  but  Com- 
posite and  Changeful  in  Structure. — No  results  of 
permanent  scientific  value  were  reached  until  in- 
quirers learned  to  answer  this  question  in  the  nega- 
tive, and  to  say  confidently  that  the  changes  observed, 


MATTER  83 

surprising  as  they  are,  take  place,  not  in  the  funda- 
mental nature  of  things,  but  in  the  arrangement,  move- 
ments, or  number  of  their  parts.  This  involves  the 
conception  that  material  things  are  composite,  that  is, 
made  up  of  many  constituents  (not  necessarily  atoms) 
which  are  so  minute  and  so  blended  together  as  to  be 
imperceptible  to  the  senses.  Empedocles  2  seems  to 
have  been  the  first  to  hit  in  a  rude  way  upon  this  ex- 
planation. He  thought  that  there  were  four  different 
and  changeless  kinds  of  world  material,  which  were 
combined  in  physical  objects  in  varying  proportions.3 
They  were  earth,  water,  air,  and  fire.  So  for  him  the 
mother-stuff  of  the  world  was  four-fold  instead  of 
single — a  hypothesis  in  which  he  was  followed  by 
most  of  the  thinkers  of  antiquity.  His  great  contri- 
bution to  science  was  the  thought  that  the  varying 
porportions  of  these  changeless  constituents  and 
their  varying  relations  to  each  other  (changes  of 
position,  etc.)  account  for  the  natural  changes  which 
perpetually  take  place  before  our  eyes. 

This,  of  course,  is  the  working  theory  of  physics 
to-day.  Steam,  water,  and  ice  are  not  now  regarded 
as  different  substances,  but  as  different  forms  of  one 
substance  (H20) ;  and  these  differences  of  form  are 
accounted  for  by  saying  that  in  the  ice  form  the  invisi- 
ble particles  of  the  substance  are  arranged  in  geomet- 

'Empedoclee  (490-430  B.  C.),  a  Greek  philosopher,  poet,  and 
statesman  of  Agrigentum,  Sicily,  was  a  man  of  great  range  of  thought 
and  of  forceful  personality.  He  is  said  to  have  posed  as  a  prophet 
and  magician. 

1  For  example,  flesh  and  blood  were  made  up  of  equal  parts  of 
the  four  elements,  while  the  bones  of  animals  had  two  parts  of  fire 
and  no  air. 


84    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

rical  groups  with  a  restricted  range  of  movement, 
in  the  water  form  they  have  such  range  of  movement 
as  to  be  largely  independent  of  each  other,  while  in 
the  vapor  form  their  movements  have  become  so 
violent  as  to  result  in  continual  mutual  repulsions. 
Nor  are  the  constituents  of  water  (the  hydrogen  and 
the  oxygen)  regarded  as  having  changed  their  funda- 
mental nature — that  is,  their  characteristic  forms  of 
behavior,  actual  and  potential — on  entering  into  the 
compound,  or  water,  condition.  They  have  only 
changed  from  one  type  of  behavior  to  another,  and 
this  owing  to  their  influence  on  each  other.  When 
hydrogen  burns  and  forms  water,  its  atoms  after  the 
union  continue  to  exist  and  to  possess  the  same  possi- 
bilities as  before;  but,  owing  to  the  influence  of  the 
oxygen  atoms  to  which  they  have  become  wedded,  the 
kind  of  activity  is  different,  just  as  a  joiner  who  one 
month  makes  a  wagon  may  the  month  following  make 
a  boat  without  any  radical  change  in  his  own  nature. 
There  are  three  distinct  ideas  involved  in  this 
way  of  thinking,  ideas  which  are  still  parts  of  ac- 
cepted scientific  tradition,  because  they  have  proved 
the  "open  sesame"  to  the  mysteries  of  change.  The 
first  is  the  idea  of  infinitesimal,  and  so  imperceptible, 
constituents.  From  this  we  see  why  the  processes  of 
change  are  mysterious.  They  take  place  on  a  plane 
too  low  for  the  observation  of  our  senses.  The  second 
is  that  of  the  constancy  of  nature  (uniformity  of 
behavior)  of  these  constituents.  This  accounts  satis- 
factorily for  the  fact  that  natural  processes  can  so 
often  be  reversed,  for  example,  the  water  formed  by 
the  combustion  of  hydrogen  being  analyzable  again 


MATTER  85 

into  hydrogen  and  oxygen.  These  two  ideas  are 
evidently  perfectly  distinct  logically ;  but  they  cannot 
well  be  treated  separately,  as  they  involve  one 
another.  The  third  idea  is  that  of  different  kinds  of 
constituents  in  material  things, — as  sodium  and 
chlorine  in  common  salt — an  idea  which  has  proved 
very  useful,  especially  in  chemistry.  Nevertheless, 
it  is  not  strictly  necessary  for  the  theoretical  explana- 
tion of  physical  changes,  and  as  we  shall  see,  meta- 
physical speculation  has  always  tended  to  eliminate 
it.  It  is  quite  conceivable  that  in  course  of  time  it 
may  be  discarded  as  regards  fundamental  existence — 
a  result  which  may  be  achieved  in  our  own  time 
through  the  electronic  theory  of  matter.  The  com- 
posite structure  of  physical  objects  and  the  constancy 
of  nature  of  their  components  may  thus  be  regarded  as 
the  oldest  empirical  principle  of  science. 

Concept  of  Matter. — I  hardly  need  to  add  that 
the  modern  physicist  does  not  recognize  any  of  Em- 
pedocles'  world  materials  as  fundamental,  but  has 
substituted  fourscore  others  in  their  place.  These — 
oxygen,  hydrogen,  carbon,  etc. — he  calls  elements; 
and  they,  together  with  their  many  combined  forms 
(mixtures  and  compounds),  he  calls  matter.  In 
science  this  term  matter,  or  "sensible  substance", 
is  simply  a  useful  general  term  standing  for  the 
broad  fact  that  the  constituents  of  natural  objects 
have  enough  in  common  to  be  classed  together.  It 
does  not  mean,  as  it  does  so  often  in  philosophy, 
that  there  is  a  common  substance  underlying  all  the 
elements,  a  substance  of  which  they  are  special  forms 
or  modes.  For  the  physicist  as  such  the  common  factor 


86    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

in  the  natural  elements  is  altogether  abstract.  That  is, 
they  all  have  certain  properties  in  common.  These 
properties  are  generally  reckoned  to  be  three:  exten- 
sion,4' gravitation,  and  inertia.  Whatever  objects 
possess  these  three  properties  are  material;  whatever 
objects  do  not  possess  them  are  immaterial.  Thus 
thought  is  clearly  immaterial,  since  it  neither  occupies 
space  nor  possesses  (literal)  weight  and  inertia.  The 
luminiferous  ether,  however,  which  has  extension 
and  inertia  and  lacks  only  weight,  is  generally  re- 
garded as  quasi-material. 

(1)  All  material  things  are  extended]  they  occupy 
space.  This  is  one  of  the  chief  traditional  distinguish- 
ing marks  of  matter.  To-day,  however,  it  is  less 
universally  affirmed  than  formerly,  that  is,  as  a 
fundamental  distinction.  There  is  quite  a  tendency 
now,  especially  among  those  holding  the  electronic 
theory  of  matter,  to  regard  extension  as  largely  the 
effect  of  an  activity  which  is  more  fundamental 
than  itself.  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  for  example,  suggests 
that  the  electrons  which  constitute  an  atom  may  bear 
about  the  same  relation  to  its  "otherwise  empty 
region  of  space"  that  a  few  thousand  printer's  pe- 
riods in  lively  motion  would  bear  to  the  space  in  a 
public  hall;  they  may  occupy  the  atom  "in  the  same 
sense  that  a  few  scattered  but  armed  soldiers  can 
occupy  a  territory — by  forceful  activity,  not  by 
bodily  bulk."5  On  this  view  the  extension  of  mat- 

4  This  is  more  properly  to  be  called  exclusive  extension,  for  the 
notion  of  impenetrability  is  always,  though  generally  not  explicitly, 
associated  with  it. 

•  Smithson,  Inst.  Kept.,  1903,  p.  231. 


MATTER  87 

ter  as  evidenced  by  the  senses  is  evidently  the  effect 
of  kinetic  energy;  it  is  a  dynamic  manifestation. 
This  conclusion  is  not  dependent  upon  the  electronic 
theory;  the  unquestioned  phenomena  of  expansion 
and  contraction,  elasticity,  porosity,  etc.,  point  in  the 
same  direction. 

(2)  All  material  things  have  weight,  or  (the  same 
thing)  display  gravitation.    This  is  still  a  mysterious 
phenomenon;  but  we  can  at  least  say  of  it  that  it, 
also,  is  a  dynamic  property,  a  manifestation  of  force. 
Moreover,  as  we  know  that  natural  forces  are  cor- 
related, that  is,  transformable  in  precise  equivalents 
into  one  another,  this  property  of  gravitation  seems 
to  furnish  a  distinction  of  convenience  rather  than  of 
essence.    It  is  far  from  being  the  only  activity,  or 
dynamic   property,   of  matter. 

(3)  If  Gravitation  is  mysterious,  inertia,  the  third 
mark  of  matter,  is  more  so.    It  seems  to  be  the  very 
core  of  the  concept  of  mass,  and  is  even  more  univer- 
sal than  gravitation.     "So  far  as  is  known  [it]  is  the 
only  property  common  to  all  kinds  of  matter  which 
is  absolutely  permanent  and  unchangeable  in  amount 
in  a  given  isolated  portion  of  matter."  *    In  physics 
the  term  inertia  is  not  used  in  the  literal  sense  of  in- 
action and  incapacity  for  action.    The  mechanical, 
and  still  more  the  molecular,  activities  of  matter  are 
too  manifest  for  such  a  conception.    The  inertia  of 
physical  science  is  defined  as  "the  property  in  virtue 
of  which  matter  cannot  of  itself  change  its  own  state 

•  A.  S.  Kimball,  "College  Physics,"  p.  18.  Cf.  R.  K.  Duncan, 
"The  New  Knowledge,"  p.  179,  "The  one  sole  unalterable  property 
of  matter  is  inertia." 


88    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

of  motion  or  of  rest."  7  At  first  thought  it  seems  to 
mean  merely  that  material  things  are  destitute  of 
initiative;  they  cannot  bring  about  changes  in  their 
own  condition.  But  that  is  by  no  means  all;  for  the 
authority  just  quoted  immediately  adds,  "The  in- 
ertia of  a  body  is  the  resistance  which  it  opposes  to 
any  change  of  its  state  whether  of  rest  or  motion." 
Inertia,  then,  stands  for  resistance,  opposition  to  and 
absorption  of  interfering  force.  This  is  evidently 
another  dynamic  property.  It  is  conceivable  only 
on  the  view  that  the  " inert"  body  is  already  doing 
something — evident  enough  in  such  cases  as  a  flying 
cannon  shot  or  a  revolving  wheel — which  it  tends  to 
persist  in  doing,  and  which  the  interfering  force  must 
overcome  if  it  is  to  effect  any  change.  Thus,  despite 
the  original  sense  of  the  term,  inertia  does  not  mean 
that  matter  is  inactive  and  idle,  but  simply  that  it  is 
persistent  in  whatever  type  of  activity  it  takes  up. 
It  will  be  seen  that  for  present  day  thought  all  three 
of  the  distinctive  characteristics  of  matter  indicate 
that  its  essence  is  dynamic,  or  energetic.  To  this 
idea  we  shall  have  to  return. 

Matter  and  Mass. — The  discussion  of  matter 
above,  it  should  be  noted,  is  not,  strictly  speaking, 
concerned  with  a  scientific  principle,  but  with  a 
scientific  concept,  or  general  working  idea.  The  for- 
mation of  that  concept,  however,  was  a  scientific 
achievement  of  first  class  importance;  for  concepts 
bear  the  same  relation  to  principles  that  terms  do  to 
propositions.  The  significance  of  the  idea  of  matter 
will  appear  more  clearly  if  we  compare  it  with  the 

7  "Ganot's  Physics,"  p.  13. 


MATTER  89 

mechanical  conception  of  mass,  which  some  physicists 
are  disposed  to  substitute  for  it,  doubtless  because 
the  latter  is  a  more  technical  term.  Mass  likewise 
stands  for  a  common  core  of  properties  possessed  by 
all  material  or  physical  objects;  and  as  a  matter  of 
fact  those  properties  are  the  identical  three  which  we 
have  found  to  be  the  marks  of  matter.  By  mass  is 
meant  the  quantity  of  existence  or  substance 8  and  the 
formula  of  that  quantity  is  the  bulk  (volume)  times 
the  density.  Now,  bulk  is  evidently  the  property  of 
extension,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  distinguishes  mat- 
ter. Density  is  some  function  of  energy,  expressed 
either  positively  in  terms  of  weight  (the  force  it  will 
exert),  or  negatively  in  terms  of  inertia  (the  force  it 
will  resist  and  absorb) ;  and  these  are  the  other  two 
differentia  of  matter.  It  might  seem  then  that  matter 
and  mass  are  synonymous  terms,  and  indeed  they  may 
often  be  treated  as  such.  Yet  there  are  differences 
between  them  which  should  not  be  overlooked.9 
They  were  formed  under  diverse  influences.  Both 
are,  of  course,  abstract  terms.  Science  does  not 
think  of  either  matter  or  mass  as  existing  by  them- 
selves, that  is,  apart  from  the  sensible  objects  which 
possess  the  properties  they  represent.  But  matter, 
when  transferred  to  the  field  of  philosophy,  may 
properly  enough  become  the  name  for  a  theoretical 
existence — a  universal  underlying  substance — which 
is  regarded  as  an  actual  existence  by  itself.  Mass, 

8Cf.  the  definition  of  "Ganot's  Physics":  "The  mass  of  a  body 
is  that  which  remains  unchanged,  in  all  the  transformations  which 
the  body  may  undergo."— 18th  ed.,  Sec.  26. 

9  Cf.  Ward's  "  Naturalism  and  Agnosticism,"  I,  p.  57. 


90    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

however,  remains  persistently  abstract  even  in  phi- 
losophy. The  reason  seems  to  be  that  in  the  sense 
in  which  it  obtains  in  physics,  it  is  a  term  framed  for 
the  purpose  of  representing,  not  all  the  properties 
common  to  physical  objects,  as  was  the  case  with  the 
scientific  term,  matter,  but  of  representing  just  those 
properties  of  them  which  belong  in  the  field  of 
mechanical  physics.  As  we  have  seen  the  properties 
happened  to  coincide  with  those  represented  by  the 
older  term;  but  apparently  it  need  not  have  been  so. 
It  is  quite  conceivable,  for  example,  that  chemical 
properties  might  have  been  found  which  charac- 
terized all  material  things  but  which  were  not  suffi- 
ciently mechanical  to  be  included  in  the  connotation 
of  the  term  mass. 

Principles  of  Matter. — The  scientific  principles 
connected  with  the  concept  of  matter  belong  in  the 
main  in  a  text-book  on  physics,  not  in  one  on  science 
in  general.  Three  of  the  most  universal,  however, — 
three  connected  more  or  less  with  ideas  already  dis- 
cussed— must  be  mentioned  here. 

That  matter  is  transferable  is  one  of  these.  Though 
matter  occupies  space,  and  does  so  in  the  exclusive 
way  which  we  call  impenetrability,  yet  it  lays  no 
claim  to  any  particular  space,  but  can  always  be 
shifted  from  one  place  to  another  by  the  exertion  of 
sufficient  force,  as  railroads,  and  steamboats,  and  all 
means  of  transportation  bear  witness.  Indeed,  so 
far  as  our  acquaintance  with  matter  goes,  it  is  always 
changing  its  location.  Science  discovers  no  object 
that  is  absolutely  at  rest. 

Matter  is  also  mutable.     Objects  of  sense  change 


MATTER  91 

their  aspect,  often  most  surprisingly,  albeit  their 
elements  do  not  change  fundamentally.  When  dif- 
ferent elements  combine,  there  appears  to  be  no  limit 
to  the  possible  transformations.  Man  finds  himself 
in  this  respect  able  to  supplement  nature,  and  pro- 
duce new  combinations — explosives,  flowers,  animals 
— which  she  never  dreamed  of.  But  even  without  new 
chemical  and  biological  combinations  the  transforma- 
tions of  material  things  are  most  remarkable.  It  is  the 
same  substance  (H20)  which  now  makes  up  the  fairy 
creations  of  frost  and  snow,  and  latei  dances  in  moun- 
tain streams  or  rages  in  ocean  storms.  At  one  time 
it  floats  peacefully  across  summer  skies ;  at  another  it 
toils  as  a  captive  titan  in  man-made  engines,  or  bursts 
furiously  from  the  torn  vents  of  active  volcanoes. 

The  third  principle  is  that  of  the  indestructibility  or 
conservation  of  matter.  This  is  properly  a  metaphys- 
ical principle,  for  no  human  instruments  or  powers 
of  perception  are  sufficiently  fine  to  establish  it 
experimentally.  Yet  scientific  experience,  at  least 
up  to  the  time  of  the  discovery  of  radium,  was  all  in 
the  direction  of  confirming  it;  so  that  it  has  long  re- 
ceived almost  unchallenged  acceptance.  We  cannot 
conceive  of  fundamental  existence  either  coming  into 
being  or  passing  out  of  it.  To  primitive  man,  indeed, 
just  that  sort  of  thing  seemed  to  be  taking  place  con- 
tinually; but  when  it  was  perceived  that  the  seeming 
annihilations  might  be  only  changes  of  structure,  and 
so  of  appearance,  and  still  more  when  in  a  multitude 
of  such  cases — as  in  the  burning  of  an  object — it  was 
shown  that  the  total  mass  apparently  remained  un- 
changed, then  the  mind's  native  tendency  of  thought 


92    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

carried  it  irresistibly  to  the  conclusion  that  matter, 
with  all  its  wonderful  mutability,  is  indestructible 
and  uncreatable,  and  consequently  constant  in  quan- 
tity. 

The  phenomena  of  radio-activity  seem  at  first 
thought  to  impeach  this  long  established  principle; 
for  in  them  we  seem  to  have  cases  of  actual  degenera- 
tion of  matter,  cases  in  which  part  of  the  material 
substance  disappears  in  the  form  of  free  energy  and 
ceases  to  be.  Yet  probably  no  physicist  considers 
that  the  core,  or  real  purport,  of  the  principle  is 
affected  by  these  new  discoveries;  on  the  contrary  he 
feels  as  confident  as  ever  that  the  sum  total  of  funda- 
mental existence,  either  as  matter,  energy,  electricity, 
or  what  not,  is  a  constant  quantity. 

Further  Simplification  Speculative. — Reference 
has  been  made  10  to  the  fact  that  while  the  idea  of  the 
essential  unlikeness,  or  heterogeneity,  of  the  physical 
elements  is  the  working  basis  of  physics  to-day,  yet  in 
the  end  it  may  not  prevail  as  regards  fundamental  ex- 
istence. This  may  come  to  be  viewed  by  philosophy, 
and  perhaps  by  science,  as  essentially  homogeneous. 
Hitherto,  however,  the  many  attempts  which  have 
been  made  to  establish  such  a  conclusion  have  come 
to  naught.  In  both  ancient  and  modern  times  stren- 
uous metaphysical  efforts  have  been  made  to  analyze 
the  elements11  in  thought,  and  reduce  them  to 
different  combinations  of  one  underlying  simple 
substance,  itself  everywhere  alike. 

10  Cf.  p.  85,  supra. 

11  If  this  were  done,  the  term  element  would,  of  course,  no  longer 
be  accurate. 


MATTER  93 

If  an  intelligent  observer  who  knew  nothing  of 
china-ware  came  upon  a  fine  display  of  such  goods,  he 
might  be  chiefly  impressed  at  first  with  their  variety 
and  beauty.  In  time,  however,  their  similarity  and  tex- 
ture would  be  likely  to  impress  him,  and  he  would 
probably  come  to  the  conclusion  that  they  were  all 
made  of  the  same  material,  a  conclusion  in  which  he 
would  be  quite  right,  for  glazing  and  decoration  aside, 
they  are  all  made  of  one  stuff — clay.  The  atomic  the- 
ory of  Democritus12  and  Epicurus13  was  an  attempt  to 
find  this  fundamental  clay  of  which  all  things  are  made 
in  tiny  indivisible  blocks,  infinitely  varied  in  size  and 
shape  but  homogeneous  and  simple  in  nature,  blocks 
which  are  characterized  by  but  one  active  property,  ex- 
clusive extension,  or  impenetrability.  Aside  from  exten- 
sion, literal  inertness  was  their  prune  characteristic.14 

"Democritus  (460-357  B.  C.)  of  Abdera,  in  Thrace,  was  the 
greatest  of  the  ancient  atomists.  He  was  called  the  laughing  phi- 
losopher because  of  his  cheerful  outlook  upon  life. 

"Epicurus  (342-270  B.  C.),  also  a  noted  atomist,  modified  (and 
marred)  the  atomic  theory  of  Democritus,  and  joined  to  it  much  of 
the  Cyrenaic  doctrine  that  pleasure  is  the  only  possible  end  of 
rational  action. 

14  This  statement  probably  does  not  apply  fully  to  Democritus,  who 
seems  to  have  regarded  his  atoms  as  possessing  also  inherent  motion 
— a  richer  and,  of  course,  less  simple  conception.  The  student  should 
distinguish  carefully  between  the  traditional,  metaphysical  doctrine 
of  atomism  referred  to  above,  the  primary  ideas  of  which  are  indivisi- 
bility, homogeneity,  and  inertness,  and  the  modern  chemical  theory 
of  atoms  which  dates  from  the  time  of  Dalton.  The  latter  requires 
neither  indivisibility  nor  inertness,  neither  homogeneity  nor  simplic- 
ity. It  is  the  doctrine  that  existence,  so  far  as  it  is  known  to  be  effi- 
cient, occurs  in  the  form  of  more  or  less  discrete,  infinitesimal  units 
of  one  kind  or  another;  and  it  explains  so  many  phenomena,  brings 
so  much  unity  into  our  knowledge,  and  has  led  to  so  many  new 
discoveries,  that  probably  no  accredited  physical  scientist  disputes  it. 


94    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

Plato,  with  his  large  mathematical  and  esthetic  inter- 
est, attempted  a  like  result  by  conceiving  of  the  one 
simple  substance,  which  he  called  non-being — really 
a  kind  of  substantial  space — as  worked  up  into 
manufactured  units  of  various  geometrical  shapes, 
manufactured,  that  is,  according  to  an  idea.  As 
one  would  expect  from  their  origin,  these  were  not 
indivisible. 

At  the  renaissance  under  the  influence  of  revived 
Greek  thought,  a  renewed  interest  awoke  in  the 
theory  of  the  essential  homogeneity  of  things.  The 
character  of  the  new  discoveries  of  Copernicus,15 
Galileo,  Kepler,  and  Newton,  fostered  this  interest. 
They  were  in  mechanical,  not  chemical,  physics, 
and  were  thus  concerned  with  the  motions  and 
quantities  of  things  rather  than  with  their  inherent 
nature.  The  motions  of  the  planets  and  the  rates 
thereof,  the  speed  of  falling  bodies,  the  principles  of 
the  inclined  plane,  the  phenomena  of  hydraulics — 
all  involving  the  fundamental  laws  of  motion,  but 
not  differences  of  specific  quality — these  were  the 
first  fruits  of  the  new  science.  In  such  a  situation 
the  old  Epicurean  theory  that  there  was  no  difference 
in  the  essence  of  things,  but  that  their  variety  arose 
solely  from  the  differences  of  number,  arrangement, 
and  movement  of  their  homogeneous  components, 
naturally  wore  a  very  plausible  aspect.  It  was 
adopted  by  both  Galileo  and  Descartes;  by  the  former 
in  substantially  the  ancient,  atomic  form,  by  the 

15  Copernicus  (1473-1543),  commonly  regarded  as  the  founder 
of  modern  astronomy,  was  a  clergyman  (canon)  and  physician  at 
Frauenburg,  Prussia. 


MATTER  95 

latter  more  nearly  according  to  the  conception  of 
Plato.  Descartes  denied  that  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  void  space,  and  held  that  matter — the  basic 
substance — is  absolutely  continuous  (and  so  infi- 
nitely divisible) 16  and  absolutely  homogeneous.  For 
him,  as  for  Plato,  matter  is  simply  space,  when  this 
is  regarded  as,  not  a  void,  but  an  extremely  thin 
substance  with  but  the  one  fundamental  quality  of 
exclusive  extension.  Descartes  parts  company  with 
Plato  by  denying  that  the  particles  of  matter  have 
been  manufactured  on  any  plan.  For  him  they  are 
accidental  results  of  the  fact  that  at  the  dawn  of 
creation  God  agitated  the  original  continuous  matter, 
thus  both  breaking  it  up  into  myriads  of  parts  and 
setting  these  in  motion.  The  particles  in  their 
movements  are  subject  to  the  control  of  divinely 
appointed  natural  laws.  By  their  movements  so 
controlled  the  present  complex  universe  has  been 
formed.  This  governance  by  natural  laws  is  the 
darkest  spot  in  Descartes'  scheme,  for  how  inert 

18  On  this  question  of  divisibility,  which  has  been  debated  since 
the  time  of  Anaxagoras  and  Democritus  in  the  fifth  century,  B.  C., 
turns  the  further  speculative  question  whether  existence  is  at 
bottom  continuous  or  discrete.  According  to  the  traditional  atomic 
view  indivisibility,  and  so  discreteness,  are  the  foundation  truths  of 
the  world.  The  atom  is  ultimate,  for  the  very  word  means  indi- 
visible. For  the  Platonic-Cartesian  conception,  on  the  other  hand, 
infinite  divisibility  is  the  ultimate  truth,  and  all  existence  is  con- 
tinuous at  bottom.  The  question  is  still  open.  We  may  think  of 
the  electrons,  for  example,  as  ultimate  and  indivisible — true  atoms 
in  the  Greek  sense — and  then  we  hold  to  basal  discreteness.  But  if, 
with  another  type  of  speculative  physics,  we  regard  the  electrons 
as  merely  points  of  concentration  of,  and  activity  in,  the  ether, 
which  itself  is  regarded  as  infinitely  divisible,  then  continuity  be- 
comes the  basal  truth. 


96    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

bits  of  substantial  space  moving  because  of  mere 
blind  impact  can  follow  natural  laws  seem  to  surpass 
imagination.17 

In  all  these  theories  the  familiar  qualities  of  things 
as  we  perceive  them  are  regarded  as  effects  made 
upon  our  organisms  by  the  various  combinations 
of  the  supposed  homogeneous  units.  Thus  we  say 
that  one  object  is  red,  another  green,  and  another 
blue ;  but,  we  are  told,  the  real  fact  is  merely  that  the 
particles  of  these  three  objects  are  so  arranged  that 
they  reflect  ether  waves  of  different  lengths  to  our 
eyes,  where  correspondingly  different  effects  are 
made  upon  the  retina.  There  are  certainly  empirical 
analogies  in  support  of  their  view.  Glass  has  not 
changed  its  essence  when,  on  being  ground  to  powder, 
it  ceases  to  be  transparent,  and  takes  on  a  white  color; 
nor  has  water  become  different  itself  when,  on  being 
mixed  with  invisible  air,  it  experiences  a  like  change 
of  aspect.  In  both  cases  the  difference  of  appear- 
ance is  due  to  a  mere  difference  of  number,  arrange- 
ment, and  rate  of  motion  of  the  constituent  particles. 

The  theory,  if  taken  seriously,  makes  startling 
changes  in  our  conception  of  the  world  around  us. 
Instead  of  a  teeming  universe  of  colors  and  sounds, 
pressures,  odors,  etc., — all  glowing,  varied,  rich,  and 
seemingly  thoroughly  actual — we  are  asked  to  regard 
the  actuality  of  things — apart  from  our  own  pecul- 
iar ways  of  knowing  them — as  but  little  more  than 
shadows  of  what  they  seem  to  be,  pale  thin  ghosts 
of  our  perceptions  of  them.  These  ghosts  are,  indeed, 

17  The  thought  that  divine  will  is  constantly  present  to  make  them 
obey  law  is  expressly  excluded  by  Descartes. 


MATTER  97 

wonderful  in  structure  from  the  mathematical  point 
of  view;  but  from  the  empirical  standpoint  the 
swarms  of  infinitesimals  which  make  them  up  are 
equally  pale  and  thin  and  elusive.  This  difficulty, 
however,  is  by  no  means  insuperable.  Science  does 
not  assume  the  correctness  of  the  mental  construc- 
tions of  common  life — our  ordinary  notions  of  the 
world.  The  real  difficulty  with  the  hypothesis  is 
that  it  does  not  really  account  for  the  facts.  If 
minute  bits  of  extension  (stiff  space)  are  to  cause 
in  us  all  the  wonderful  panoramas  of  color  and  mix- 
tures (and  symphonies)  of  sound,  and  so  forth,  which 
we  call  the  external  world,  it  must  be  because  they 
do  something — produce  or  reflect  ether  waves,  for 
instance.  But  if  they  do  anything,  they  are  not  inert, 
and  the  theory  is  self -contradictory.  No  doubt  it  can 
be  amended  so  as  to  attribute  to  its  units  only  a  few 
very  simple  activities,  such  as  hardness  and  elasticity, 
but  recent  advances  in  physics  have  shown  that  this 
concession  is  but  the  opening  wedge  for  the  entrance 
of  the  quite  opposite  view  that  activity  is  of  the 
very  essence  of  matter,  and  inertness  and  even  ex- 
tension but  its  accidents.18 

On  the  other  hand,  when  the  needless  hypothesis 
of  essential  inertness  (literal)  is  abandoned,  it  is  as- 

18  Cf.  p.  69,  supra.  President  Nichols  speaks  of  the  "extreme 
complexity  of  the  material  atom,"  and  says  that  "the  iron  atom 
must  be  capable  of  vibrating  in  hundreds  of  different  periods  .  .  . 
swinging  or  bounding,  revolving  or  shuddering.  .  .  .  Before  the 
evidence  of  the  spectroscope,  the  older  idea  of  the  atom  as  a  simple, 
structureless  body  falls  to  the  ground.  The  complexity  of  a  grand 
piano  seems  simple  in  comparison  with  the  iron  atom." — Lecture 
on  "Physics,"  p.  21. 


98    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

suredly  a  possibility,  and  a  possibility  to  which  spec- 
ulation in  physics  perpetually  returns,  that  the  many 
elements  which  science  has  discovered  are  modifica- 
tions— evolutionary  developments  possibly — of  one 
original  substance.  It  certainly  seems  highly  im- 
probable that  the  members  of  the  very  large  ele- 
mental group  of  metals  with  their  many  and  strong 
similarities  should  be  eternally  distinct  and  ultimate. 
The  electronic  theory,19  now  in  the  ascendant,  may 
yet  reveal  matter  to  us  as  essentially  homogeneous,  its 
various  forms  being  due  to  differences  of  intensity 
and  organization.  Our  organizing  and  unifying 
habit  of  mind  leads  us  naturally  to  expect  some  such 
outcome.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is,  of  course,  conceiv- 
able that  there  are  eternal  and  absolute  differences 
between  substances,  irreducible  now  and  always.20 
Discreteness  and  Continuity. — What  was  essen- 
tially a  scientific  distinction,  the  distinction  between 
the  discrete  and  the  continuous,  received  implicit 
recognition  very  early  in  primitive  life,  and  long  be- 
fore the  dawn  of  science.  When  the  patriarch  Jacob 
sent  a  present  to  his  brother  Esau,21  the  description 
of  it  is  simple  and  definite.  It  consisted  of  220  goats, 
220  sheep,  30  camels,  50  cattle,  and  30  asses.  No 
explanation  of  this  statement  is  needed.  But  when 
in  the  next  chapter  he  is  said  to  have  bought  a  "  par- 
cel "  of  land  near  the  city  of  Shechem,  the  ground  pur- 
chased and  the  price — "100  pieces  of  money" — are 
stated  in  terms  needing  definition.  How  much  was 
a  "parcel"  of  land?  What  was  a  "piece  of  money"? 

19  Cf .  p.  125  f,  infra.  «  Cf.  note  at  the  end  of  the  chapter. 

»  Cf.  Genesis  32:13  f. 


MATTER  99 

A  shekel  of  silver  perhaps,  or  some  multiple  of  a 
shekel;  but  what  was  a  shekel?  What,  too,  was  the 
need  of  such  a  word? 

Why  is  Abraham  said  to  have  purchased  the  field 
and  cave  of  Machpelah  for  400  shekels  of  silver.22 
Why  not  for  400  silvers,  like  the  220  goats,  and  so 
forth,  in  Jacob's  present?  Obviously  the  answer  is 
that  the  animals  existed  as  separate  units  which  could 
be  counted,  but  the  silver  did  not.  In  order  to  handle 
it  in  a  way  which  would  be  recognized  as  equitable  by 
the  parties  to  the  transaction,  the  silver  had  to  be 
divided  up  in  some  artificial  and  conventional  way, 
that  is,  weighed  off  into  shekels,  or  some  other  unit 
agreed  upon.  In  most  countries  to-day,  for  the  con- 
venience of  commerce,  the  government  makes  this 
division,  and  certifies  to  the  amount  of  precious  metal 
in  the  separated  part,  or  coin,  by  an  image  and  super- 
scription stamped  upon  it.  In  China,  however,  the 
old  method  of  private  calculation  still  prevails,  and 
each  merchant  carries  with  him  on  his  trading  ex- 
peditions a  little  scales  for  weighing  silver.23  This 
need  of  commerce  for  a  means  of  computing  quanti- 
tatively objects  of  value  which  cannot  be  dealt  with 
adequately  by  mere  counting  rests  upon  the  broad 
fact  that  some  things  in  nature 24  exist  in  a  manifest 
singleness,  whereas  others  have  no  regular  and  typi- 
cal boundaries.  The  former  are  called  discrete,  the 
latter  continuous,  quantities. 

M  Id.,  Chapter  23. 

23  Copper,  however,  is  coined  and  is  then  called  "cash." 

24  The  distinction  is  equally  evident  in  the  products  of  human 
manufacture.    The  builder  orders  so  many  thousand  brick,  but  so 
many  thousand  feet  of  lumber. 


100    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

It  is  true  that  all  things  are  in  some  measure  sepa- 
rate; that  is,  they  are  found  in  masses  which  show 
much  similarity  of  internal  character,  along  with 
evident  contrasts  to  other  masses.  Even  rocks  and 
sandbanks,  owing  to  the  sorting  agency  of  constant 
forces,25  are  distinct  from  their  environment,  while 
continents  and  oceans,  planets  and  solar  systems, 
show  a  more  evident  degree  of  singleness,  which  is 
often  loosely  called  individuality,26  and  which  enables 
us  to  know  them  as  continents,  oceans,  and  so  forth. 
Indeed,  but  for  this  singleness  it  is  hard  to  see  how 
knowledge  of  the  external  world  could  arise. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  human  need,  however, 
this  singleness  is  often  insufficient;  for  full  often  the 
wholes  are  too  large  for  our  purposes,  and  we  must 
deal  with  parts  of  them.  Moreover,  their  boundaries 
are  wont  to  be  too  various  for  the  purposes  of  com- 
merce, and  still  more  insufficient  for  the  ends  of  sci- 
ence. To  purchase  a  stratum  of  rock  or  a  river  of 
water  would  be  to  bargain  for  a  very  uncertain  quan- 
tity. Such  continuous  objects  must  have  arbitrary 
and  conventional  divisions — perches,  gallons,  etc., — 
imposed  upon  them;  that  is,  the  parts  of  them  that 
we  deal  with  we  have  to  make  for  ourselves.  Con- 
tinuous quantity  may,  therefore,  be  defined  as  material, 
or  sensible,  substance  which  can  be  counted,  and  de- 
scribed quantitatively,  only  after  being  artificially 
divided  up.  Water  and  all  fluids  are  of  this  character; 

"  Cf .  Herbert  Spencer  on  segregation.  Epitome  of  Herbert 
Spencer's  Philos.,  p.  53  f. 

16  This  word  should  be  reserved  for  types  comparable  with  living 
forms. 


QUANTITY  101 

also,  stone  in  the  quarry,  coal  and  ore,  land,  elec- 
tricity. These  must  all  be  separated,  ideally  and 
symbolically  if  not  physically,  into  distinct  parts  or 
units  before  they  can  be  described  in  terms  of  num- 
ber. The  fact  that  it  is  possible  to  agree  upon 
standard  units  by  means  of  which  this  separation  into 
arbitrary  parts  can  be  effected,  and  adequate  con- 
trol of  this  kind  of  quantity  secured,  was,  as  has  been 
intimated,  an  early  discovery  of  commerce,  and  of 
commerce  in  the  form  of  barter.  Our  most  common 
units  of  measure — foot,  yard  (a  rod  or  wand),  mile 
(thousand  paces),  gallon  (a  bowl) — witness  to  their 
primitive  origin.  These,  however,  have  naturally 
not  been  at  all  uniform,  and  it  has  been  one  of  the 
major  tasks  of  science  to  fix  with  precision  these  com- 
mon standard  units,  and  to  devise  new  ones  fitted 
for  its  special  needs. 

Discrete  quantity,  on  the  other  hand,  is  material 
substance  which  in  ordinary  experience  presents  it- 
self to  the  senses  in  distinct  and  separate  items  or 
units.  Of  this  kind  are  fruits,  eggs,  trees,  animals,  and 
indeed  all  organisms;  also,  such  inorganic  objects  as 
detached  stones,  islands,  stars.  In  fact,  whatever  can 
be  counted  in  its  natural  state,  and  the  result  stated 
with  substantial  truth  arithmetically,  is  discrete. 

Advanced  Science  Quantitative. — This  distinc- 
tion, though  it  came  to  scientific  recognition  long 
after  it  was  implicitly  known  in  the  practical  life  of 
men,  is  yet  of  fundamental  significance;  for  it  nearly 
corresponds  to  the  grand  division  of  the  natural  world 
into  organic  and  inorganic.  All  organisms  are  dis- 
crete, while  hi  the  main  the  inorganic  realm  is  con- 

UEHARY 

UNIVERSITY  CF  CAUftffiftt* 


102    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

tinuous.  It  is  true  that  some  inorganic  objects — 
planets,  etc., — and  many  objects  of  human  manufac- 
ture, are  discrete,  but  most  of  these  have  some  kind  of 
organization,  or  purposive  arrangement  about  them, 
and  so  are  allied  to  the  organic  realm  by  similarity 
of  some  sort. 

Furthermore,  the  great  and  fruitful  quantitative 
development  of  science  is  based  primarily  upon  the 
aspect  of  continuity  which  so  much  of  material  ex- 
istence presents  to  the  enquirer.  Science  in  its  ele- 
mentary stage  is  qualitative — concerned  chiefly  with 
the  presence  or  absence  of  qualities.  But  as  it  ad- 
vances, its  attempts  at  greater  precision  of  observa- 
tion and  statement  oblige  it  to  take  account  of  things 
quantitatively.  It  has  to  consider  the  amounts  or 
dimensions  of  the  objects  before  it,  and  of  then-  func- 
tions and  constituents. 27  This,  of  course,  creates  a  need 
for  accurate  measurement,  a  need  which  is  felt  first 
and  most  in  dealing  with  continuous  quantity.  Later 
it  is  discovered  that  even  when  the  quantities  are  dis- 
crete, adequate  exactness  can  be  attained  only  through 
measurements,  since  the  units  are  never  quite  uniform. 

Standards. — Measurements  to  be  of  much  value 
require  standard  units,  for  the  great  service  of  the 
measured  result  is  in  furthering  comparisons  between 

17  Jevons  dwells  justly  upon  the  complexity  of  such  inquiries. 
Regarding  scientific  knowledge  of  the  so-called  fixed  stars,  he  says, 
"We  must  then  determine  separately  for  each  star  the  following 
questions:  1.  Does  it  move?  2.  In  what  direction?  3.  At  what 
velocity?  4.  Is  this  velocity  variable  or  uniform?  5.  If  variable, 
according  to  what  law?  6.  Is  the  direction  uniform?  7.  If  not, 
what  is  the  form  of  the  apparent  path?  8.  Does  it  approach  or 
recede?  9.  What  is  the  form  of  the  real  path?"— "Principles  of 
Science,"  p.  280. 


QUANTITY  103 

quantities  that  have  been  measured  by  the  same  unit. 
Especially  when  the  results  are  to  receive  social  recog- 
nition and  acceptance  must  the  unit  be  a  standard 
one,  that  is,  one  generally  recognized.  Such  a  unit 
may  be  defined  as  any  convenient  magnitude — a 
platinum  rod,  for  example — which  shall  be  agreed 
upon  as  the  one  in  terms  of  which  all  similar  magni- 
tudes shall  be  described.28  It  is  necessarily  arbi- 
trary, for  nature  does  not  furnish  units  that  are  con- 
stant.29 It  is  an  ideal  of  men  of  science  to  connect 
their  standards  as  closely  as  possible  with  fixed  nat- 
ural distinctions,  statements  of  comparative  dimen- 
sions made  in  such  terms  being  more  illuminating,  and 
inferences  in  larger  number  and  of  greater  reach  then 
being  possible.  The  only  case  in  which  they  have  suc- 
ceeded in  realizing  this  ideal  in  connection  with  an 
ultimate  standard  appears  to  be  that  of  angular  mag- 
nitude. The  total  angular  space  in  a  plane  about  any 
given  point,  the  perigon30  as  it  has  been  called,  is  evi- 
dently a  uniform  quantity.  In  so  far  the  standard  of 
reference  is  natural,  but  it  does  not  become  a  stand- 
ard unit  until  agreement  is  reached  as  to  the  way  it 
shall  be  subdivided — as  into  360  degrees — and  that  is 
an  arbitrary  affair  again. 
The  metric  system  is  an  ambitious  but  unsuccessful 

28  Cf.  Jevons,  "Prine.  of  Science,"  Chapter  14.  Measurements  and 
standards  are,  of  course,  parts  of  the  methodology  of  science;  but 
since  they  are  not  properly  methods  of  thought,  it  seemed  best  to  refer 
to  these  topics  briefly  here  rather  than  to  include  them  in  part  one. 

M  It  may  be,  indeed,  that  the  wave  length  of  a  particular  kind  of 
light  and  the  molecular  mass  of  some  element  are  examples  of 
natural  units  which  are  constant;  but  these  are  theoretical  exist- 
ences, not  objects  of  perception,  and  so  not  readily  available  as 
standard  unite.  M  Cf .  Jevons,  o.  c.,  p.  306. 


104    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

attempt  to  achieve  a  like  result  in  the  matter  of  a 
standard  of  length.  The  ten-millionth  part  of  the 
terrestrial  arc  from  the  pole  to  the  equator  was  se- 
lected as  the  standard  or  unit,  and  its  magnitude  as- 
certained by  a  costly  trigonometrical  survey.  Quite 
naturally  the  computation  proved  inaccurate,  so 
that  the  standard  French  meter  bar  is  not  what  it  was 
meant  to  be  by  at  least  one  part  in  5527,  and  is  ac- 
tually an  arbitrary  unit  after  all.  Even  were  it  pos- 
sible to  make  such  a  subdivision  with  entire  accuracy, 
a  changeless  natural  basis  for  the  standard  of  length 
would  not  be  obtained  thereby,  for  it  is  quite  certain 
that  the  dimensions  of  the  earth  undergo  change. 

Measured  Results  Always  Relative. — The  numer- 
ical description  of  any  quantity  that  is  continuous,  or 
treated  as  such,  is  of  course  expressed  in  terms  of 
the  standard  unit.  It  is  the  statement  of  a  ratio. 
This  ratio,  as  Professor  Jevons  points  out,  often 

X 

takes  the  form  p— q; 81  in  which  p  is  the  quantity 

"  This  is,  of  course,  not  the  only  form  in  which  the  ratio  is  ex- 
pressed, as  Jevons  makes  plain.  (0.  c.,  p.  285  f.)  He  also  describes 
interestingly  (pp.  292  f.,  296  f.)  some  of  the  ways  in  which  objects 
which  cannot  be  measured  directly  may  yet  have  then-  movements 
or  dimensions  determined  quantitatively  by  means  of  some  mediat- 
ing relation.  Thus  the  time  of  the  moon's  rotation  on  its  axis 
cannot  be  observed  directly,  for  the  features  on  its  surface  do  not 
change  position  as  regards  the  mundane  observer.  This  very  fact, 
however,  enables  us  to  infer  that  the  rotation  period  coincides  with 
that  of  its  revolution  around  the  earth,  which  latter  is  open  to  ob- 
servation. Gold  leaf,  again,  is  not  measurable  in  its  third  dimen- 
sion because  of  its  excessive  thinness;  but  by  weighing  it  in  quantity, 
and  by  means  of  its  specific  gravity  computing  its  net  volume,  and 
then  dividing  by  the  total  area  of  the  sheets  weighed,  it  is  possible 
to  determine  the  average  thickness. 


QUANTITY  105 

to  be  measured  and  q  is  the  standard  unit.  The 
meaning  is,  that  the  quantity  in  question  equals 
some  multiple  (perhaps  fractional)  or  sub-multiple  of 
the  unit.  It  will  be  seen  that  quantitative  descrip- 
tions are  necessarily  relative;  they  refer  always,  not 
only  to  the  subject-matter,  but  also  to  some  recog- 
nized object  beyond.  Inasmuch  as  such  descriptions 
become  more  and  more  the  main  objective  of  physical 
science,  it  is  evident  that  its  concern  is  with  the  or- 
ganization or  structure  of  the  world  rather  than  with 
its  nature  as  revealed  in  immediate  perception.  In 
other  words,  it  tells  us  about  things  but  does  not 
present  things  to  us,  as  art,  for  example,  seeks  to  do. 
Its  aim  is  descriptive,  not  appreciative,  knowledge.32 
NOTE: — It  may  be  doubted  if  the  old  atomic 
theory  ever  was  acceptable  to  many  minds  which 
did  not  at  the  same  time  hold  to  theistic  dualism, 
that  is,  believe  in  an  external,  personal  Creator,  to 
whose  province  otherwise  insuperable  difficulties 
could  be  relegated.  For  by  itself  the  hypothesis 
seems  quite  hopeless.  It  offers  no  agency  to  account 
for  the  transformation  of  dead,  inert  blocks — in- 
finitesimal brickbats — into  the  familiar,  present  day 
living  organisms  of  nature.  The  atoms  themselves 
are  impotent  by  hypothesis;  and  to  add  that  these 
impotencies  are  flying  about  at  random,  and  so  come 
into  all  sorts  of  different  geometrical  situations,  is  to 
suggest  nothing  more  than  picturesquely  varying 
clusters  of  impotencies.  It  is  as  though  grains  of 
sand  were  represented  as  turning  into  birds  and 

82  This  distinction  will  be  made  clearer  in  a  subsequent  chapter. 
Cf.  chap.  IX. 


106    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

horses  and  men  on  coming  into  certain  positions 
relative  to  each  other. 

Those  who  conceive  such  transformations  as  pos- 
sible fail  to  distinguish  between  conceptual  and 
actual  situations.  In  nature  we  often  find  groups 
and  combinations  of  molecules  doing  things,  and 
sometimes  very  surprising  things,  which  none  of  the 
molecules  do  by  themselves;  but  then  in  dealing 
with  nature  we  make  no  pretense  to  knowing  all  the 
possible  activities  of  the  molecules,  still  less  of  know- 
ing that  they  can  do  nothing  of  themselves.  There 
may  well  be  potencies  and  activities  of  the  mole- 
cules which  are  quite  imperceptible  to  us  until  they 
are  either  massed  or  brought  more  or  less  into  con- 
flict with  the  activities  of  other  molecules.  The 
philosophical  atomist,  however,  is  dealing  with  a 
purely  theoretical  situation,  in  which  the  quantities 
(the  atoms)  have  no  latent  or  imperceptible  attri- 
butes, nor  indeed  any  attributes  whatever  except 
those  with  which  he  expressly  endows  them.  In 
such  cases  there  is  no  residuum  of  unexplored  possi- 
bility to  fall  back  upon  as  the  cause  of  phenomena 
which  the  posited  factors  do  not  warrant. 

EXERCISES 

1.  Show  in  detail  how  the  first  material  principle  established 
by  science  (Cf.  p.  85,  supra),  with  the  three  ideas  involved 
in  it,  serves  to  explain  the  passage  of  such  seemingly  simple 
substances  as  water,  air,  etc.,  (1)  into  the  form  of  inorganic  salts, 
(2)  into  the  forms  of  vegetable  life,  and  (3)  into  those  of  animals. 
Point  out  how  it  explains  thereby  the  interdependence  of  in- 
organic substances  and  vegetable  and  animal  forms,  and  also  the 
various  natural  processes  of  decay  and  dissolution. 


QUANTITY  107 

2.  Illustrate  the  mutability  of  material  substances  by  the 
examples  of  carbon  and  silicic  acid. 

3.  Copy,  or  write  originally,  a  description  of  some  place  or 
event,  pointing  out  therein  ten  examples  of  discrete  quantity  and 
ten  of  continuous. 

4.  Outline  and  illustrate  the  three  methods  of  exact  measure- 
ment described  by  Jevons  in  his  "Principles  of  Science,"  pp.  282- 
299. 

5.  Describe  clearly  seven  different  kinds  of  standard  unit  as 
discussed  by  Jevons  ("Prins.  of  Science,"  chap.  14),  and  show 
how  derived  units  are  obtained  from  one  or  more  of  these. 

6.  Make  a  careful  abstract  of  Descartes'  ideas  as  to  matter  as 
an  underlying  or  original  substance.     (Cf.  "Method,"  Pt.  V, 
and  "Prins.  of  Philosophy,"  Pt.  II,  or  some  good  history  of 
philosophy.)    Give  his  theory  as  to  how  that  substance  came  to 
assume  the  forms  of  our  present  world. 


CHAPTER  VII 
ENERGY— DYNAMISM 

Inquiry  into  Changes  Leads  to  the  Thought  of 
Energy. — We  have  seen  that  scientific  inquiry  has 
occupied  itself  from  the  beginning  with  the  phe- 
nomena of  change.  To  ascertain  the  order  and  causes 
of  the  movements  and  transformations  that  go  on  in 
nature  is  the  main  objective  of  science.  Indeed,  the 
natural  laws  which  it  frames  are  properly  but  state- 
ments of  that  order  and  its  conditions.  Yet  rarely, 
if  ever,  do  these  statements  of  sequence,  however 
full  and  precise,  completely  cover  the  phenomena 
before  the  investigator.  There  remains  for  him 
probably  always,  in  addition  to  the  facts  he  has  thus 
organized  into  a  scientific  system,  a  residuum  of 
impression  or  conviction  which  is  at  once  impressive 
and  baffling;  and  which  does  not  find  expression  in 
any  of  his  laws,  because  it  is  too  vague  for  clear 
statement.  It  is  the  conception  of  energy  or  force  1 
or  power — the  working  or  efficient  agent  in  the 
changes  he  observes.  It  is  not  a  full  account  to  say 
that  the  earth  tends  to  move  toward  the  sun  inversely 
with  the  square  of  the  distance.  There  is  some 

1  The  physicist's  technical  distinction  between  force  and  energy 
does  not  seem  required  for  the  purposes  of  this  chapter.    It  is  there- 
fore ignored  for  the  sake  of  simplicity. 
108 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  109 

agency  which  produces  this  result,  though  what  that 
is  we  cannot  tell  at  present. 

Is  Energy  Actual? — This  conception,  which  men 
in  practical  life  generally  take  for  granted,  has  been 
impeached  by  Hume  hi  a  notable  criticism.  He 
characterizes  it  as  an  illegitimate  idea  on  the  ground 
that  it  is  not  supported  by  any  adequate  ''impres- 
sion," or  immediate  experience.  He  shows  first 
quite  convincingly  that  we  never  actually  come  upon 
any  power  at  work  hi  changes  that  are  external  to 
us;  that  is,  "any  quality  which  binds  the  effect  to 
the  cause,  and  renders  the  one  an  infallible  conse- 
quence of  the  other.  We  only  find  that  the  one  does 
actually  in  fact  follow  the  other.  The  impulse 
of  one  billiard  ball  is  attended  with  motion  in  the 
second.  This  is  the  whole  that  appears  to  the  outward 


senses."  2 

Nor  will  Hume  allow  that  we  have  any  inner  ex- 
perience of  power,  either  in  the  movement  of  our 
bodies  or  the  exercise  of  our  minds.  "The  power  or 
energy,"  he  says,  "by  which  this  is  effected,  like  that 
in  other  natural  events,  is  unknown  and  incon- 
ceivable." In  this,  however,  he  seems  clearly  in 
error.  He  admits  that  all  our  movements  are  ac- 
companied with  a  feeling  of  effort;  but  denies  that 
this  justifies  the  notion  of  power,  or  in  any  way 
warrants  us  in  transferring  the  object  of  that  feeling 
to  situations  beyond  our  immediate  consciousness. 
"This  sentiment  of  an  endeavor  to  overcome  resist- 
ance," he  says,  "has  no  known  connection  with  any 
event:  What  follows  it  we  know  by  experience;  but 
»  "Enquiry,"  Sec.  VII,  Pt.  1. 


110    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

could  not  know  it  a  priori"  3  Very  true,  but  since 
this  sentiment  is  always  present  in  changes  initiated 
by  us  through  the  medium  of  our  bodies,  why  may 
we  not  conclude  a  postiori  that  there  is  some  working 
agency  (power,  or  energy)  in  our  bodies  either  fur- 
thering or  opposing  our  wishes?  Hume's  agnostic 
contention  at  this  point  is  evidently  the  consequence 
of  his  expulsion  of  logical  construction  from  the 
field  of  knowledge  and  his  rigorous  limitation  of  the 
latter  to  immediate  experience.4  The  great  part 
which  discussion  of  the  energies  of  nature  plays  to- 
day in  the  literature  of  science,  both  pure  and  applied, 
is  evidence  enough  that  Hume's  extreme  criticism 
has  fallen  to  the  ground.  The  fact  seems  to  be  that 
for  most  trained  investigators,  as  well  as  for  men  in 
general,  the  straining  of  which  we  are  conscious  in 
our  own  organisms  when  in  action  is  accounted 
sufficient  ground  for  the  posit  of  an  active  somewhat 
within  us,  a  somewhat  which  is  transferred  to  similar 
situations  external  to  us,  and  used  as  the  natural  cue 
for  their  interpretation.  The  analogy  between  a 
human  arm,  for  example,  in  the  act  of  pulling  a  rope, 
and  a  toiling  horse  or  a  tugging  steam-engine  doing 
the  same  sort  of  thing,  is  too  great  to  be  ignored.  If 
there  is  a  mysterious  factor  within  ourselves  insep- 
arably connected  with  the  production  of  results,  it 
does  not  appear  why  it  should  not  be  present  in  other 
objects  which  act  similarly.  That  factor  we  call 

3  He  adds  significantly,  "  It  must,  however,  be  confessed  that 
the  animal  nisus  which  we  experience,  though  it  can  afford  no  accu- 
rate precise  idea  of  power,  enters  very  much  into  that  vulgar,  in- 
accurate idea  which  is  formed  of  it." 

4  Cf .  p.  53  f .,  supra. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  111 

force,  energy,  power,  at  times  will.  Criticism  finds 
it  easy  to  find  defects  in  any  description  of  this 
efficient  agency,  but  quite  unable  to  resolve  it  into 
anything  simpler  or  more  familiar  than  itself.  It  is 
evidently  an  object  of  immediate  experience,  a  brute 
fact,  albeit  far  from  distinct. 

Energy  the  Efficient  Factor  for  Science. — Re- 
turning from  the  philosopher's  criticism  of  energy 
to  the  scientist's  practical  dealings  with  it,  it  is  to  be 
noted  that  the  latter  accepts  it  on  the  ground  of 
what  it  does  or  can  do.  "We  find,"  says  Professor 
Watson,5  "bodies  are  capable  of  doing  work  .  .  .; 
this  capacity  for  doing  work  is  called  energy."  Thus 
coal  possesses  energy,  because  under  proper  condi- 
tions it  is  capable  of  heating  buildings,  drawing 
loads,  and  running  factories.  A  noticeable  term  in 
the  definition  is  the  word  "capacity."  Energy  is 
not  merely  a  body's  actual  work  doing,  but  its  ca- 
pacity for  doing  work.  The  energy  of  a  storage  bat- 
tery is  represented,  not  simply  by  the  work  it  is  do- 
ing at  any  given  moment  in  propelling  a  car  through 
the  streets,  but  includes  also  the  amount  of  such  pro- 
pulsion which  it  can  effect  if  kept  continuously  at 
work  until  exhausted. 

Energy  of  Action  and  Energy  of  Position. — Upon 
this  idea  is  based  one  of  the  physicist's  prime  dis- 
tinctions, the  distinction  between  kinetic  (moving) 
energy — that  is,  actual  present  activity — and  poten- 
tial energy,  or  power  to  act  at  the  stimulus  of  suitable 
conditions.  The  waters  in  the  reservoir  of  a  power 
plant  may  be  very  still  on  a  quiet  day.  Their  kinetic 

*  "A  Text-Book  of  Physics,"  p.  85. 


112    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  'PRINCIPLES 

energy  is  then  slight;  yet  their  potential  energy,  due 
to  their  elevation  above  the  tail  race  of  the  power 
house,  may  be  great,  and  perhaps  vast.  They  can 
do  a  large  amount  of  work.  Now,  this  capacity,  or 
potency,  is  plainly  due  to  their  position;  to  do  that 
work  actually  they  must  leave  that  elevation  and 
descend  upon  the  power-wheels  below.  Therewith 
their  advantage  of  position  is  lost;  that  is,  in  gaining 
actual  present  efficiency  (kinetic  energy),  they  have 
lost  potential  energy.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the 
waters  were  pumped  back  into  the  reservoir,  the 
kinetic  energy  used  up,  or  kinetically  lost  in  the 
process,  would  be  made  good — friction  aside — by  the 
potential  energy  gained.  The  like  is  true  in  all  cases 
of  work  doing,  as  in  that  of  the  uncoiling  and  recoil- 
ing of  a  spring,  the  expansion  and  compression  of  a 
gas,  and  so  forth. 

The  Conservation  of  Energy. — From  such  facts 
the  physicist  concludes  that  in  any  closed  dynamic 
system  the  total  amount  of  energy  will  remain  con- 
stant, the  potential  energy  lost  being  balanced  by 
the  kinetic  energy  developed,  and  vice  versa.  A 
frictionless  pendulum  oscillating  in  a  vacuum  would, 
under  the  action  of  gravitation,  be  such  a  closed 
dynamic  system.  On  its  downward  course  it  would 
develop  kinetic  energy,  but  at  the  cost  of  a  precise 
equivalent  of  potential  energy.  On  its  upward 
course  hi  overcoming  gravitation  and  gaming  an 
elevation  equal  to  that  with  which  it  started,  it 
would  do  work  and  loose  kinetic  energy;  but  this 
would  be  fully  stored  up  and  preserved  in  the  form 
of  the  potential  energy  which  it  thereby  acquired. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  113 

Such  a  system,  if  free  from  all  interference — that  is, 
if  really  closed — would  keep  moving  forever.  We 
know,  of  course,  that  no  pendulum,  however  care- 
fully made  and  adjusted,  will  swing  forever.  The 
reason  is  that  it  is  not,  and  cannot  be  made,  a  com- 
pletely closed  system.  There  are  always  more  or  less 
in  the  way  of  interfering  factors — friction,  air- 
resistance,  and  so  forth.  Indeed,  with  one  possible 
exception,  we  have  reason  to  think  there  is  no  closed 
system  in  all  the  physical  universe.  That  possible 
exception  is  the  physical  universe  itself — as  a  whole. 
If  it  is  the  whole  absolutely,  all  dynamic  agencies 
being  included  within  it,  it  would  seem  that  there 
could  not  be  any  interference  with  it  from  without. 
Men  of  science  have  therefore  generally  concluded 
that  in  the  universe  as  a  whole  the  total  amount  of 
energy,  kinetic  and  potential,  is  constant,  a  conclu- 
sion which  is  known  as  the  principle  of  the  conserva- 
tion of  energy,  and  which  has  been  called  the  "key- 
stone of  modern  science."  6 

There  is  a  caution  to  be  uttered  at  this  point  which 
is  too  often  omitted.  This  "keystone"  is  largely 
metaphysical.  It  cannot  be  established  experi- 
mentally, for  no  human  senses  and  no  instruments 
are  able  to  discover  empirically  that  absolutely  no 
energy  is  ever  lost  in  the  changes  of  form  which  it 
undergoes.  The  experimental  evidence  simply  points 
that  way.  Moreover,  when  we  argue  from  the  con- 
ception of  the  universe  as  a  whole,  that  is,  a  complete 
and  essentially  limited  dynamic  unit,  we  are  evi- 
dently dealing  with  a  metaphysical  idea,  and  one 

•  Watson,  o.  c.,  p.  87. 


114    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

that  is  assumed.  We  do  not  know  that  there  is  any 
universe  in  this  sense  of  a  complete,  self-contained, 
externally  unaffected,  physical  unit.7  Furthermore, 
even  on  the  empirical  side,  the  new  phenomena  of 
radio-activity  seem  to  impeach  the  absoluteness  of 
this  "keystone"  principle;  for  in  them  we  seem  to 
have  cases  of  actual  degeneration  of  matter,  cases  in 
which  part  of  the  material  substance  passes  off  in  the 
form  of  energy,  and  ceases  to  be  matter.  If  such  is 
actually  the  case,  the  total  amount  of  matter  has  been 
lessened  and  the  total  amount  of  energy  increased,  and 
neither  matter  nor  energy  is  rigidly  conserved. 

Law  of  Constancy. — When  taken,  however,  not  as 
an  eternal  basal  fact  of  the  universe,  but  as  a  useful 
working  principle,  it  is  doubtful  if  any  physicist  con- 
siders that  the  core,  or  real  purport,  of  the  conserva- 
tion of  energy,  or  of  its  correlate  the  conservation 
of  matter,  still  less  of  the  two  taken  together,  is 
affected  by  these  new  discoveries.  It  still  remains 
true  for  him  that  the  sum  total  of  fundamental 
existence,  matter  and  energy,  and  whatever  other 
substances  there  may  be,  taken  together,  remains  con- 
stant; for,  whatever  in  radio-activity  ceases  to  exist 
as  matter  continues  to  exist  in  the  form  of  energy 
or  electricity  or  something  else.  In  other  words,  the 
new  discoveries  have  greatly  extended  our  conception 
of  the  mutability  of  existence  and  modified  our  ideas 
of  the  fixity  of  matter,  but  they  have  not  destroyed 
our  faith  in  the  constancy  of  existence  as  regards 

7  Herbert  Spencer  based  hie  cosmic  theory  on  the  denial  of  this 
conception.  For  him  the  universe  was  not  a  unit;  it  was  in- 
finite. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  1 15 

amount.  This  conviction,  known  as  the  law  of  con- 
stancy, is  not  based  primarily  on  experimental  evi- 
dence. Rather  is  it  due  to  the  inability  of  the  human 
mind  to  conceive  of  the  absolute  beginning  of  sub- 
stance or  its  absolute  annihilation. 

The  Correlation  of  Energy — It  is  involved  in 
the  broad  principle  of  conservation  that  energy  is 
transformable.  It  is  present  in  the  world  in  various 
guises,  such  as  mass  movements,  heat,  magnetism, 
and  so  forth.  These  seem  to  be,  not  independent 
forces,  as  was  once  supposed,  but  modes  of  the  one 
entity  called  energy.  The  evidence  of  this  is  that 
they  can  be  converted  one  into  another — an  impor- 
tant truth  which  constitutes  the  principle  called  the 
correlation  of  energy.  Energy,  like  matter,  is  wonder- 
fully changeable;  it  is,  indeed,  a  very  chameleon  as 
to  type,  having  the  capacity,  and  also  the  habit,  of 
changing  its  form  from  potential  to  kinetic  and  back 
again,  from  linear  to  curved  motions  of  various  com- 
plexities, from  molar — that  is,  perceptible  mass 
movements — to  those  molecular  shiftings  which  are 
imperceptible  as  movements  but  are  often  perceived 
in  a  confused  way  by  the  temperature  sense  as  heat ; 
from  chemical  activities  to  electrical,  magnetic,  and 
optical,  and  vice  versa.  Moreover,  these  transforma- 
tions appear  to  take  place  under  a  system  of  precise 
equivalents,  a  given  amount  of  heat,  for  example, 
being  convertible  into  a  definite,  fixed  quantity  of 
electrical  activity,  and  so  forth. 

Potency  and  Actuality. — In  these  dynamic  meta- 
morphoses the  passage  of  kinetic  into  potential 
energy  and,  sooner  or  later,  back  again,  is  one  es- 


116    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

pecially  hard  to  understand.  How  can  we  separate 
the  notion  of  energy  from  that  of  action?  Kinetic, 
or  moving,  energy  is  a  term  that  presents  a  coherent 
idea;  but  what  is  "potential  energy"?  A  kind  of 
sleeping  or  latent  energy  seems  to  be  implied,  a  power 
that  can  do  things  but  is  not  actually  doing  them, 
an  activity  which  is  not  at  present  active!  How  is 
that  conceivable?  How  can  we  conceive  of  potential 
energy  as  real,  that  is,  as  activity?  The  answer 
seems  to  be  that  it  is  in  a  way  similar  to  that  used  for 
the  explanation  of  the  metamorphoses  of  material 
things;  it  is  by  thinking  of  imperceptible  activities. 
Changes  of  position  of  imperceptible  components  go 
far  to  account  for  the  surprising  changes  that  occur 
in  matter.  So  imperceptible  functions  or  activities 
may  account  for  the  fact  that  a  body  can  do  work 
when  it  is  not  doing  it.  We  may  think  of  the  activity 
(kinetic  energy)  as  present  and  sufficient  for  the 
work  in  question,  but  as  occupied  at  present  in  other 
ways  that  we  cannot  see.  Coal,  for  example,  has  a 
certain  potential  of  heat  and  power.  To  think  of 
that  potential  energy  as  a  present  existence,  an 
actual  activity  now,  we  have  only  to  conceive  of  the 
carbon  and  other  molecules  and  atoms  of  the  coal  as 
busily  engaged  in  processes  which  are  too  limited  in 
range  for  us  to  perceive — a  conception  to  which  such 
phenomena  as  those  of  elasticity  also  point.  They 
are  occupied  with  intermolecular  movements,  and 
perhaps  still  more  with  interatomic  movements;  and 
from  these  secret  processes,  confined  now  to  imper- 
ceptible ranges,  comes  all  the  furious  perceptible 
energy  later  developed  in  the  engine  furnace;  all, 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  117 

that  is,  except  what  is  contributed  by  the  atoms  of 
oxygen  from  without.  If  we  think  of  combustion  as 
the  riotous  assault  or  wooing  of  the  carbon  atoms  by 
the  oxygen  atoms,  we  may  say  that  what  is  done  in 
the  process  is  merely  to  change  the  direction  and  type 
of  the  activity  of  the  two  kinds  of  atoms,  not  to 
awaken  either  of  them  out  of  sleep. 

A  simpler  illustration  is  perhaps  to  be  found  in  the 
case  of  a  coiled  spring,  as  in  a  clock.  When  the 
spring  is  released,  we  are  not  required  to  think  that 
the  molecules  of  the  metal  suddenly  awake  and  act, 
still  less  that  some  new  agency  independent  of  them 
leaps  into  the  field.  All  the  energy  which  the  re- 
leased spring  displays  can  be  accounted  for  by  the 
simple  hypothesis,  that  before  the  release  the  mole- 
cules were  swinging  in  symmetrical  curves  under  the 
influences  of  two  tendencies  or  dispositions — one  to 
assume  the  open  or  uncoiled  position  with  its  greater 
freedom  of  molecular  movement,  the  other  (co- 
hesion) to  keep  within  touch  of  each  other.  The 
moment  one  end  of  the  spring  is  released,  the 
former  tendency  is  no  longer  balanced  by  the  latter, 
and  movement  of  the  spring  as  a  whole — of  all 
the  molecules  under  the  common  tendency — is  the 
consequence.  It  may  well  be  that  the  potency  of 
the  waters  in  a  power  reservoir  is  to  be  similarly 
explained. 

Thus  actuality,  to  use  Aristotle's  term,  (the  kinetic 
type)  seems  to  stand  for  energy  manifested  at  long 
range,  and  in  unbalanced,  non-harmonic  ways.  In 
human  beings  we  should  call  such  courses  intemper- 
ate, headlong,  and  passionate.  Potency,  on  the  other 


118    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

hand,  stands  for  balanced,  "symmetrical,  and  in  a 
sense  self-controlled  processes. 

Diffusiveness  of  Free  Energy. — No  dynamic  prin- 
ciple has,  perhaps,  greater  practical  bearings  and 
more  far-reaching  metaphysical  implications  than 
that  of  the  diffusiveness  of  free  energy.  On  it  is 
based  the  physicist's  distinction  between  availabk 
and  unavailable  energy.  Though  energy  is  always 
capable  of  work,  it  will  not  always  do  it,  by  any 
means.  It  is  not  always  available,  the  proper  condi- 
tions not  being  producible.  On  a  hot  summer  day 
there  is  a  vast  amount  of  energy  present  in  the  steam 
that  hangs  over  the  ocean  and  makes  life  a  burden  in 
the  coast  cities;  but  there  appears  to  be  no  way  of 
making  it  work.  It  is  too  generally  diffused.  Energy 
is  available  for  working  purposes  only  when  it  is  con- 
centrated and,  relatively  to  the  environment,  intense. 
It  is  not  the  mere  fact  of  gaseous  (steam)  pressure 
in  the  cylinder  of  a  locomotive  that  makes  it  a  pow- 
erful worker,  for  there  is  gaseous  pressure  all  about 
the  engine,  without  as  within,  below  as  well  as  above. 
It  is  the  fact  that  the  steam  pressure  within  is  so  greatly 
in  excess  of  the  air  pressure  without.  A  steam  pressure 
of  fifteen  pounds  to  the  square  inch  would  leave  the 
engine  as  completely  a  "dead"  locomotive  as  though 
there  were  neither  steam  nor  fire  within  it;  for  fifteen 
pounds  is  the  pressure  of  the  outer  air.8  Evidently, 
then,  one  of  the  first  problems  of  applied  mechanics 
is  to  secure  controllable  concentrations  of  energy. 

8  In  condensing  engines  greater  availability  and  efficiency  are 
secured  by  removing  the  antagonistic  pressure  of  the  air  through 
the  use  of  a  vacuum. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  1 19 

Opposing  this  effort  of  the  physicist  and  the  in- 
ventor is  the  tendency  of  free9  energy  toward  a 
state  of  diffusion,  like  that  of  heat  in  atmospheric 
vapors.  In  this  way  it  is  likely  to  be  lost  as  regards 
availability.  All  active  mechanical  contrivances 
lose  available  energy  through  friction.  Part  of  the 
force  used  by  them  is  diffused  thereby  in  the  form 
of  heat  in  the  bearing  parts.  All  heat  engines,  too, 
loose  available  energy  through  radiation,  the  heat 
passing  into  objects  where  it  does  no  work,  and 
generally  cannot  be  reclaimed  for  working  purposes. 
Now,  nature  is  full  of  active  mechanisms — seas, 
rivers,  winds,  moving  creatures,  etc. — and  in  all  such 
cases,  also,  energy  is  continually  running  down  into 
diffused  and  irreclaimable  heat.  Indeed,  the  great 
power  source  of  the  solar  system,  the  vast  sun  itself, 
is  unceasingly  losing  great  stores  of  available  energy 
through  radiation. 

As  the  physicist  views  this  age-long  process  of 
"degradation"  of  energy,  he  draws  two  conclusions: 

(1)  There  is  a  time  coming  when  no  energy  will  any 
longer  be  available  for  work.    It  will  all  be  diffused 
to  a  common  level  or  pitch,  and  nothing  whatever 
will  go  on.    The  universe  will  be  a  uniformly  warm 
(or  cool)  mass,  henceforth  forever  motionless  and 
inert.    This  is  not  a  cheerful  prospect  to  one  who 
looks  upon  creation  with  eyes  of  friendly  interest. 

(2)  "  Since  the  quantity  of  unavailable  energy  is 
continually  increasing,   there  must   have   been   a 

•This  word  is  added  here,  because,  if  as  the  dynamists  hold 
matter  is  made  up  of  energy,  then  one  form  of  it,  what  may  be 
called  organized  or  fixed  energy,  shows  little,  if  any,  of  this  tendency. 


120    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

time  when  none  of  the  energy  of  the  universe  was 
unavailable,  and  before  which  no  phenomenon  such 
as  we  are  acquainted  with  can  have  occurred,  for 
every  such  phenomenon  necessarily  involves  a  deg- 
radation of  energy."  10 

This  last  conclusion  bids  us  pause;  for,  if  nothing 
went  on  in  that  prior  tune,  how  did  the  present  (age- 
long) physical  process  begin?  We  known  nothing 
of  physical  change  without  antecedent  changes  as  its 
cause.  We  seem  here  to  have  an  antinomy,  or  conflict 
of  laws;  for  a  corollary  of  the  law  of  the  conservation 
of  energy  calls  on  us  to  ignore  the  law  of  causation. 
It  is  evident  that  in  such  statements  the  physicist 
has  crossed  the  border  into  metaphysics.  As  we  have 
seen,  his  assumption  underlying  these  conclusions 
is  the  metaphysical  one  that  the  physical  universe  is 
an  absolute  unit,  a  complete  and  closed  dynamic 
system.11  From  the  second  conclusion  to  which  it 
leads  him,  this  seems  to  be  a  very  questionable 
assumption.  Other  metaphysical  conceptions  are 
possible,  some  one  of  which  may  work  better.  We 
may,  for  example,  think  quite  as  properly  that  the 
physical  universe  is  in  some  sort  of  working  touch 
with  a  higher 'non-physical  universe;12  or  we  may 
regard  it  as  merely  the  abstraction  which  our  limited 
powers  of  knowledge  make  from  a  totality  of  existence 

10  W.  Watson,  "A  Text-Book  of  Physics,"  p.  88. 

11  Cf.Whetham  ("Recent  Developments  in  Physical  Science,"  p.5), 
"This  final  sleep  of  the  universe  depends  on  the  assumptions  that  the 
universe  is  an  isolated  system,  finite  in  extent,  and  that  no  process  of 
molecular  concentration  of  energy,  such  as  was  imagined  by  Maxwell, 
is  going  on  anywhere  throughout  the  depths  of  time  and  space." 

12  This  is  substantially  the  theistic  conception. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  121 

much  of  which  is  non-physical  and  as  such  either 
quite  or  mostly  unknown  to  us.  If  either  of  those 
conceptions  is  true,  there  must  be  possibilities  in 
the  future  course  of  the  world  which  no  study  of 
physical  facts  will  reveal. 

Vagueness  of  the  Term  Energy. — When  we  ask 
what  this  ever-present  agency,  called  energy,  is  in 
itself,  we  put  a  question  which  cannot  be  answered. 
We  do  not  know,  just  as  we  do  not  know  what 
matter  is  "in  itself,"  that  is,  what  its  fundamental 
functions  and  relations  are.  But  it  may  be  useful  to 
inquire  into  the  direction  hi  which  we  may  hope  for 
an  answer  in  future. 

Energy  Not  a  Mere  Mode  of  Motion. — One  thing 
may  be  affirmed  confidently:  energy  is  not  merely 
a  mode  of  motion.  For  the  older  atomism  energy  was 
simply  motion,  and  motion  in  the  simple  sense  of 
change  of  place,  its  different  forms  being  due  entirely 
to  the  complexity  of  the  situations  in  which  the 
moving  particles  often  became  involved.  The  form- 
ula— almost  the  sacred  motto — of  this  hypothesis 
was,  "Force  is  but  a  mode  of  motion,"  the  change 
of  place  involved  in  the  motion  being  thought  of  as 
more  often  molecular  than  molar.  Now,  motion  is 
indeed  the  usual  accompaniment  or  manifestation 
of  energy;  but  it  appears  to  be  only  the  manifestation. 
No  statement  of  motion  pure  and  simple  covers  the 
idea  of  energy,  which  is  instinctively  conceived  as 
the  moving  agency,  not  the  phenomenon  of  moving. 
Energy,  as  we  have  seen,  is  "capacity  for  doing 
work."  To  describe  the  mover  as  an  inert  (that  is, 
inactive  or  dead)  particle  is  a  contradiction  in  terms, 


122    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

for  even  to  communicate  or  transfer  motion  is  a  kind 
of  activity.13  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  word 
"mere,"  with  its  dogmatic  negation,  is  omitted, 
it  appears  to  be,  so  far  as  it  goes,  a  very  true  account 
of  such  forces  as  heat  and  light  to  call  them  modes 
of  motion. 

Other  Theories  as  to  Energy. — The  logical  possi- 
bilities as  to  the  nature  of  energy  seem  to  be  three: 

(1)  It  may  be  a  world-wide  existence  as  universal 
and  substantial  as  matter,  yet  quite  distinct  from  mat- 
ter. From  this  dualistic  14  standpoint,  formerly  the 
favorite  one  with  those  who  gave  it  due  recognition, 
energy  is  the  Protean  formative  agency  of  the  uni- 
verse, and  matter  is  the  pawn  with  which  it  plays,  the 
brick  with  which  it  builds,  the  clay  which  it  molds. 
We  have  seen  that  man  at  a  certain  stage  in  develop- 
ment is  apt  to  attribute  natural  processes  to  special 
divinities  whose  whole  nature  consists  in  maintaining 
those  processes.  We  have  only  to  conceive  of  such 
divinities  as  but  different  forms  or  modes  of  one 
incessantly  active  divinity  to  have  a  close  mytho- 
logical analogy  to  this  dualistic  view.15 

13  This  fact  was  overlooked  by  the  old  materialistic  atomism, 
which  believed  that  the  world  could  be  resolved  into  a  complex 
system  of  moving  but  powerless  units.    It  saw  no  problem  in  im- 
pact and  elasticity. 

14  So  called  because  matter  and  energy  have  generally  been  con- 
sidered to  make  up  the  physical  universe. 

16  The  first  to  put  this  conception  into  outspoken  philosophic 
form  appears  to  have  been  Empedocles,  who  posited  "Love"  and 
"Hate"  (attraction  and  repulsion)  as  the  fundamental  agencies  of 
the  world.  This  view  should  not  be  confounded  with  the  theistic 
dualism  referred  to  in  the  last  chapter.  In  the  latter  the  cosmic 
active  agent  is  a  person,  not  a  blind  force. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  123 

In  its  older  form  of  a  universal  agency  seated  at 
once  everywhere  and  nowhere,  it  was  a  vague  con- 
ception belonging  to  elementary  rather  than  to 
advanced  science.  It  sufficed  for  such  simpler  gener- 
alizations as  the  statement  that  heat  expands  metals; 
but  it  gave  no  adequate  analytical  insight  into 
natural  situations,  such  as  we  gain,  for  example, 
when  we  say  the  molecules  of  a  metal  in  that  height- 
ened state  of  activity  which  we  call  heat  require  more 
room,  and  by  that  activity  secure  it.  In  its  present-day 
form,  however,  it  is  not  open  to  this  objection,  for 
its  seat  now  is  placed  in  the  units  of  matter,  which 
are  regarded  as  its  centers  of  agency  and  vehicles 
of  movement. 

(2)  Another  possible  view  is  that  already  referred 
to  in  the  discussion  of  potency.  It  regards  energy 
as  a  pure  abstraction,  a  mere  general  term  for  the 
various  types  of  matter's  activities.  From  this  point 
of  view  matter  alone  is  substance,  and  forces  and 
all  energetic  phenomena  are  merely  the  functions  of 
matter — ways  it  has  of  acting.  These  ways  differ 
greatly  with  circumstances.  Ordinarily  the  molecules 
of  water  draw  nearer  together  with  the  lowering  of 
the  temperature,  but  below  about  39F.  they  do  just 
the  contrary,  drawing  more  and  more  apart  until 
at  32F.  they  spring  into  fixed  geometrical  groups, 
so  forming  crystals  of  ice.  When  the  activities 
of  matter  are  greatly  alike  on  a  wide  scale  we  dignify 
them  with  the  name  of  "forces."  Thus  the  type  of 
activity  that  seems  to  be  most  characteristic  of 
molecules  we  call  heat,  that  most  characteristic 
of  atoms  we  call  chemical  affinity,  and  that  of  the 


124    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

thousand-fold  smaller  constituents  of  the  atom  we 
call  electricity. 

In  support  of  this  view  it  may  be  urged  that  our 
analysis16  has  shown  the  distinctive  properties  of 
matter — extension,  weight,  and  inertia — to  be  large- 
ly, if  not  wholly,  dynamic.  Moreover,  the  other 
manifold,  but  perhaps  not  universal,  properties  of 
material  things — elasticity,  heat,  chemical  affinity, 
magnetism,  etc. — appear  to  be  dynamic  likewise. 
Indeed,  there  is  no  property  of  matter,  with  the 
possible  partial  exception  of  extension,  that  is  not 
an  energetic  one.  The  argument,  then,  is  a  fair  one, 
that  in  using  the  terms  matter  and  energy  we  are 
referring  to  mere  aspects  of  one  entity.  Matter  is 
known  to  us  only  by  what  it  does,  and  energy  is 
never  found  apart  from  matter.  When  thinking  of 
it  as  a  substance,  that  is,  the  possessor  of  properties 
and  modes  (forms  of  existence),  we  call  it  matter; 
when  thinking  of  what  it  does,  its  functions,  we 
commonly  call  these  forces,  or  energy,  whereas  we 
should  recognize  them  as  mere  activities  of  the 
substance  matter.  To  invoke  another  substance  to 
account  for  these  functions  seems  to  violate  the  law 
of  parsimony  by  the  reification  of  an  abstraction. 
Thus,  when  the  coal  in  the  railroad  car  resists  the 
efforts  of  the  locomotive  to  move  it — that  is,  mani- 
fests inertia — we  attribute  that  to  the  coal  itself. 
An  activity  of  matter  is  all  that  is  involved  in  that 
resistance.  When  later  in  the  furnace  fierce  heat  and 
vast  masses  of  gas  and  vapor  come  from  the  coal, 
by  what  necessity  is  it  that  we  declare  the  coal  (and 

18  Cf.  p.  87  f,  supra. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  125 

oxygen)  to  be  no  longer  the  agent,  but  an  additional 
existence  called  energy  to  have  appeared  on  the 
scene  and  to  have  assumed  the  major  role?  The 
truth  seems  to  be  that  when  the  molecules  of  coal 
resist  the  interference  of  the  locomotive  (that  is, 
show  inertia);  when  they  oppose  invasion  of  the 
space  needed  for  their  activities,  as  in  thwarting  the 
inrush  of  another  car  (show  impenetrability);  and 
when  hi  combustion  they  throw  off  their  former 
alliances  with  their  fellows  and  join  riotously  with 
new  mates  (oxygen  atoms),  so  displaying  the  activi- 
ties of  chemical  affinity  and  heat,  they  are  hi  all 
these  cases  alike  acting  on  their  own  account,  and 
are  not  the  mere  vehicles  of  some  second  and  separate 
agent. 

To  such  arguments  the  physical  dualist  responds 
by  pointing  out  that  the  credentials  of  energy  as  a 
substance — a  permanent  existence  in  itself,  and  not 
the  mere  manifestation  of  something  else — are  vir- 
tually the  same  as  those  of  matter.  Is  matter 
substantial  because  it  is  transferable?  17  Energy  is 
equally  transferable.  Indeed,  it  is  the  real  cosmic 
Mercury,  flitting  incessantly  through  the  universe. 
Is  matter  a  substance  because  it  is  mutable — capable 
of  surprising  changes  of  form?  Energy  is  equally  so; 
witness  the  transformation  of  invisible  atmospheric 
heat  into  the  lightning's  blinding  flash.  The  correla- 
tion of  forces  parallels  the  mutability  of  matter. 
Is  matter  indestructible,  its  total  mass  remaining  con- 
stant? The  like  is  true  of  energy,  the  conservation 
of  energy  standing  on  as  good  evidential  grounds  as 

17  Cf.  p.  90,  supra. 


126    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

the  conservation  of  matter.  What  reason  is  there 
then,  it  is  demanded,  why  matter  should  be  accred- 
ited as  a  substance,  and  energy  be  denied  that  rank? 
This  is  certainly  a  very  pertinent  question,  yet  it  is 
perhaps  not  unanswerable. 

It  does  not  follow  that  if  equal  claims  as  to  sub- 
stantial rank  can  be  established  for  the  two  entities 
separately,  therefore  both  are  to  be  accredited  as 
substances  together.  On  the  contrary,  when  either 
matter  or  energy  is  admitted  to  be  substance,  the 
question  of  the  substantiality  of  the  other  takes  on  a 
new  aspect.  "Theoretical  existences  are  not  to  be 
multiplied  without  necessity,"  declares  the  law  of 
parsimony.  Now,  given  either  one  of  the  above 
as  an  admitted  theoretical  existence  (substance), 
the  question  arises:  Do  we  need  to  posit  another? 
May  not  the  phenomena  represented  by  the  other 
term  be  sufficiently  accounted  for  as  special  activities 
or  modes  of  the  substance  already  recognized? 
The  answer  certainly  seems  to  be  that  they  may  be 
so  accounted  for,  and  that  consequently  under  the 
law  of  parsimony  the  other  claimant  is  to  be  excluded 
from  substantial  rank. 

But  why,  it  may  be  asked,  may  not  energy  rather 
than  matter,  be  the  real  substance?  It  certainly 
is  conceivable  that  it  may  be;  which  brings  us  to  the 
third  view. 

(3)  We  may  think  of  energy  as  the  true  funda- 
mental substance  of  the  world,  and  matter  as  one  of 
its  modes,  its  more  highly  organized  form.  This  is 
the  conception  embodied  in  the  electronic  theory  of 
matter,  or  at  least  in  one  form  of  it.  According  to 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  127 

that  conception  fundamental  existence  is  essentially 
active — a  heaving  ocean  of  being — but  it  is  not  active 
matter;  it  is  that  more  subtile,  weightless  agency 
which  we  call  electricity.  This,  which  is  the  real  agent 
in  all  that  goes  on  in  the  physical  world,  the  root  of 
all  natural  forces,  exists  in  the  form  of  more  or  less 
discrete  and  extremely  active  units  (electrons), 
which  are  a  thousand  fold  smaller  than  the  hydrogen 
atom;  units  which  more  than  make  up  for  their  lack 
of  weight  by  the  strong  attractions  and  repulsions 
which  characterize  them.  It  is  when  a  swarm  of 
these  units  are  organized  into  a  permanent  dynamic 
system  that  the  material  atom  comes  into  existence, 
and  manifests  that  weakened  form  of  attraction 
which  we  call  gravitation.  These  material  atoms 
the  theory  recognizes  as  distinct  and  largely  fixed 
types  of  being,  but  the  static,  inert  aspect  which 
they  often  wear  is  declared  to  be  external  only  and 
altogether  superficial.  They  are  really,  like  the 
solar  system,  organized  units  of  internal  movement, 
and  so  are  as  truly  and  essentially  energetic  as  the 
electrons  which  constitute  them. 

It  will  be  seen  that  this  third  view  agrees  with  the 
second  in  positing  but  one  fundamental  substance, 
but  differs  in  regarding  energy  and  not  matter  as 
that  one  substance.  In  this  reversal  of  the  perspec- 
tive, it  has  the  support  of  the  remarkable  newly 
discovered  phenomena  of  radio-activity.  The  radium 
atom  does  seem  to  be  constituted  of  components 
vastly  smaller  than  itself,  though  whether  these  are 
to  be  regarded  as  electrons  (dynamic  substantial 
units  pure  and  simple)  or  corpuscles  (electrically 


128    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

charged  bits  of  ether  or  what-not)  is  disputed.  On 
either  of  these  latter  views,  however,  it  seems  im- 
possible to  think  of  matter  as  the  fundamental  sub- 
stance. That  which  is  made  up  of  components  is  of 
course,  not  fundamental;  it  is  rather  a  stage  of  ex- 
istence— possibly  the  advanced  and  most  impor- 
tant stage,  possibly  also  merely  an  intermediate 
stage. 

To  sum  up,  it  appears  (1)  that  we  may  think  of 
energy  as  a  substance — a  permanent,  self-assertive, 
indestructible  existence  with  constant  properties — 
and  think  of  it  as  such  in  connection  with  matter 
which  is  recognized  at  the  same  time  as  equally  a  sub- 
stance. This  view,  however,  seems  to  encounter  the 
frown  of  the  law  of  parsimony. 

(2)  We  may  think  of  it  as  merely  a  general  term 
for  the  activities  of  matter — matter's  way  of  behav- 
ing.   The  phenomena  of  radio-activity  seem  to  make 
this  inadequate,  unless  the  behavior  of  electricity, 
and  perhaps  of  the  ether,  is  also  taken  into  account. 

(3)  Finally  we  may  think  of  it  as  itself  the  one 
fundamental   (physical)   existence,  manifold  in  its 
forms,  ceaselessly  active  in  its  nature,  but  capable 
of  organization  into  sustained  systems,  or  fixed  types 
of  activity,  (atoms  and  molecules  of  matter)  in  which 
the  movements  take  place  mostly  within  the  system 
and  consequently  do  not  affect  our  senses  as  free 
energy  does. 

This  last  view  is  philosophic  rather  than  scientific; 
for  in  physics  it  is  found  more  convenient  to  apply 
the  term  energy  to  the  activities  of  an  agent  than  to 
the  agent  itself — essentially  the  second  view  above. 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  129 

It  is  quite  possible,  however,  and  probably  common, 
to  combine  the  second  and  third  views  by  suitable 
modifications.  One  may  lean  to  the  electronic  hy- 
pothesis, and  regard  matter  as  an  organized  form  of 
electricity,  and  yet  find  it  most  useful  to  regard  en- 
ergy as  an  abstraction,  a  name  for  the  activities  of 
whatever  is  substantial,  whether  matter,  electricity, 
or  ether. 

Electricity. — These  latter  views,  together  with  the 
radiational  phenomena  of  the  vacuum  tubes,  radium, 
etc.,  have  given  electricity  quite  a  new  standing  in 
scientific  thought.  It  was  formerly  ranked  with 
heat  as  a  dynamic  manifestation  merely — a  mode  of 
motion.  At  present,  whether  identified  with  energy 
or  not,  it  is  generally  considered  to  be  a  substance,  a 
substance  which,  as  we  have  seen,  differs  from  mat- 
ter in  the  far  greater  minuteness  of  its  fundamental 
units,  and  hi  the  fact  that  it  bears  a  double,  not  a 
single,  sign;  that  is,  its  units  show  repulsions  as  well 
as  attractions  for  other  electric  units,  whereas  matter 
as  such  shows  only  (weak)  attraction  for  other  mat- 
ter. On  the  other  hand,  matter's  attractions  are  un- 
affected by  the  presence  of  intervening  objects,  while 
electricity's  are  not.  In  the  electronic  theory  elec- 
tricity is  not  fundamentally  a  different  substance 
from  matter  but  simply  the  elementary  or  atomic 
form  of  matter;  and  that  whether  it  is  identified 
with  energy  or  not.  The  more  conservative  physi- 
cists, however,  are  inclined  to  regard  it  as  a  sub- 
stance distinct  from  matter. 

Ether. — Repeated  reference  has  been  made  to  a 
theoretical  existence  or  substance  called  ether.  The 


130    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

ether  owes  its  standing  in  science  primarily  to  the 
needs  of  optics.  Since  light  is  a  wave  movement,  a 
medium  in  which  the  waves  may  travel  is  demanded; 
and  no  medium  known  through  the  senses  is  ade- 
quate. Of  late  this  theoretical  medium  has  been  called 
for  also  by  other  branches  of  physics  for  bridging 
chasms  between  the  facts.  Thus,  wireless  teleg- 
raphy is  supposed  to  utilize  pulsations  in  the  ether, 
and  lines  of  strain  in  the  ether  have  been  invoked  to 
explain  a  magnet's  characteristic  attractions  and 
repulsions.  Electrical  theory,  too,  is  disposed  to  call 
it  in  to  furnish  mass  to  the  electrons  or  charged  cor- 
puscles which  make  up  the  atoms.  These  electrons 
are  said  to  push  or  drag  it  along.  The  more  thorough- 
going electronists  consider  it  as  essentially  one  with 
electricity,  the  electrons  being  but  centers  of  influence 
or  points  of  strain  within  it.  Hitherto  it  has  generally 
been  thought  of  as  quasi-solid,  since  nothing  else 
seemed  capable  of  transmitting  vibrations  at  the 
speed  of  light.  Yet  this  is  a  most  difficult  conception, 
for  the  planets  swing  through  it  at  tremendous  veloc- 
ities, and  apparently  quite  without  friction.  At 
present  the  solid  conception  is  undergoing  challenge, 
and  the  thought  is  broached  that  in  the  ether  as  in 
the  atom  the  sensitive  extension  may  be  due,  not  to 
brute,  static  spread-outness,  but  to  a  high  degree  of 
activity  of  exceedingly  fine  units.  This  conception 
seems  to  point  toward  the  identification  of  electricity 
and  the  ether  just  referred  to,  and  to  fall  in  with  the 
idea  that  ether  is  simply  substance  at  the  lowest 
degree  of  organization.  More  conservative  thought, 
however,  prefers,  as  in  the  case  of  electricity,  to  re- 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  131 

gard  ether  as  a  distinct  substance  by  itself,  one  of  the 
four  ultimate  irreducible  factors  of  the  physical 
world,  matter,  energy,  and  electricity  being  the  others. 
For  the  radical  school  there  is  but  one  fundamental 
substance,  electricity,  matter  and  ether  being  its 
modes;  and  it  is  a  matter  of  verbal  convenience 
whether  energy  shall  be  identified  with  electricity, 
or  regarded  as  its  behavior  in  all  its  various 
forms. 

Seat  of  Efficiency. — One  question  regarding  en- 
ergy remains:  Where  does  this  work  accomplishing 
agency  reside?  What  is  its  seal — that  is,  the  place 
where  it  shows  itself  and  responds  to  stimulus,  where 
it  may  be  found,  and  perhaps  be  harnessed  to  hu- 
man tasks?  By  the  common  consent  of  present- 
day  investigators,  its  seat  is  in  matter,  not  outside  of 
it.  Energy,  whether  we  regard  it  as  substance  or  a 
form  of  activity,  is  an  agency  internal,  not  external, 
to  material  things.  The  two  are  not  related  as  is  the 
water  in  the  mill-race  to  the  overshot  wheel  which  it 
turns,  but  rather  as  the  electric  current  in  a  power 
wire  seems  to  be  related  to  the  lamp  which  it  causes 
to  glow.  In  the  inorganic  world  it  is  in  the  molecules, 
atoms,  and  electrons  that  energy  is  to  be  found, 
abiding  there  either  as  potent  occupant  or  as 
very  essence.  As  a  consequence  for  the  physics 
of  to-day  these  infinitesimal  units  are  centers  or 
systems  of  marvelous  potencies,  indeed  the  great 
power-houses  of  the  universe.  In  living  things 
additional  seats  of  energy  are  found  in  the  cells 
of  the  organism,  and  of  course  in  the  organic  in- 
dividual as  a  whole.  In  a  man,  for  example,  action 


132    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

may  be  aroused  by  some  stimulus  applied  to  the 
cells  of  his  body,  such  as  food  or  the  fumes  of 
ammonia,  or  it  may  be  called  forth  by  a  stimulus 
applied  to  him  as  a  man,  a  blow  or  a  cry  for  help, 
for  example. 

It  is  noticeable  that  in  all  these  cases  of  known 
seats  of  energy  and  efficiency  the  active  agents  are 
organized  units;  that  is,  they  are  dynamic  systems 
of  internal  movement  which  maintain  their  respective 
types  because  of  the  mutual  relations  and  activities 
of  their  parts.  On  a  large  scale  the  solar  system,  in 
which  the  form  of  the  whole  remains  substantially 
unchanged  and  persistent  because  the  planetary 
movements  are  continuous  and  in  closed  curves  which 
themselves  determine  the  form,  is  an  example  of  such 
an  organized  dynamic  unit.  It  is  significant  that 
nowhere  do  we  get  energetic  responses  from  bodies 
or  elements  known  to  be  without  organization.  Mere 
unorganized  masses,  as  such, — stones,  sands,  waters, 
etc. — appear  to  do  nothing  of  themselves.  They 
move  only  as  they  are  moved;  they  are  literally  inert. 
When  activity  appears  in  them,  as  in  the  vaporizing 
of  water,  it  is  because  of  something  their  molecular  or 
atomic  constituents  are  doing,  and  these  constituents 
are  organized. 

Individuals. — It  is  convenient  to  have  a  general 
term  for  all  kinds  of  organized  units  or  centers,  and 
that  term  is  supplied  hi  the  word  individual.  This 
word  has  hitherto  had  little  definite  meaning  outside 
the  domain  of  living  things;  but  the  new  conceptions 
as  to  the  structure  of  matter  and  the  seat  of  energy 
are  making  it  needful  to-day  in  the  inorganic  realm, 


ENERGY— DYNAMISM  133 

also.18  A  true  individual,  whether  organic  or  physi- 
cal (inanimate),  is  any  existence  whatever  that  is  organ- 
ized into  a  persistent  unity,  or  permanent  type,  and 
which  is  consequently  indivisible  in  the  sense  that 
when  broken  up  the  type  is  destroyed.  Thus  a  mole- 
cule of  water  is  as  truly  an  individual  (indivisible)  as 
a  dog  or  a  horse,  because  it  has  a  persistent  type 
which  is  due  to  its  organization — two  parts  of  hydro- 
gen wedded  to  one  of  oxygen — and  because  on  sub- 
division, that  is,  into  oxygen  and  hydrogen,  it  ceases 
to  be  water.  Using  this  term  to  signify  all  such  organ- 
ized and  unified  centers  of  existence,  we  reach  the 
conclusion  that  the  individual  is  the  most  important 
and  significant  kind  of  existence,  for  it  is  the  only 
kind  that  is  known  to  do  things;  it  is  everywhere  the 
working  agent,  the  seat  of  energy  and  efficiency. 

EXERCISES 

1.  Describe  five  distinct  cases  of  the  correlation  of  forces, 
each  of  them  involving  at  least  two  transformations. 

2.  When  a  broadside  is  fired  from  one  of  the  newer  battleships, 
with,  say,  an  energy  sufficient  to  lift  a  dozen  of  the  large 
ocean  liners  (Cf.  "The  Super-Dreadnaught"  in  Harper's  W'kly, 
May  25,  1912),  show  where  that  energy  was  in  all  the  long  pre- 
ceding months  when  the  guns  and  powder  were  idle.    Show  how 
we  can  conceive  of  it  as  not  sleeping  but  active  (i.  e.  actual),  and 
what  were  the  more  evidently  active  states  that  preceded  the 
manufacture  of  the  powder. 

3.  Give  in  detail  five  examples  of  the  apparently  irretrievable 
loss— that  is,  "degradation"— of  available  energy. 

18  In  fact  they  bring  a  challenge  to  the  very  notion  of  any  part  of 
nature  as  truly  inorganic,  that  is,  unorganized.  A  world  the  funda- 
mental active  constituents  of  which  are  individuals  would  seem  to 
pousess  necessarily  some  measure  of  organization  everywhere. 


134    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

4.  Describe  five  cases  of  potential  energy,  and  show  in  each 
how  the  seemingly  latent  force  may  be  thought  of  as  actually 
kinetic. 

5.  Give  three  examples  of  physical  individuals,  and  show 
what  likenesses  they  have  to  organic  individuals,  such  as  single 
plants  and  animals. 

6.  Give  in  your  own  words  a  detailed  abstract  of  Hume's 
argument  ("Enquiry  Concern.  Human  Understand.,"  sec.  7) 
against  the  validity  of  the  idea  of  power,  making  clear  what  his 
canon  of  a  valid  idea  is,  and  how  he  maintains  that  this  canon  is 
not  met  hi  our  experience  either  of  outward  objects  or  of  our 
bodily  movements  nor  yet  hi  the  workings  of  our  minds. 

7.  Discuss  critically  the  grounds  of  our  belief  that  energy  and 
matter— one  or  both— are  indestructible. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
MECHANISM 

Professor  Huxley  in  one  of  his  popular  lectures 
lauds  the  philosopher  Descartes  as  a  notable  pioneer 
in  the  science  of  physiology.  His  strongest  count  in 
behalf  of  the  noted  Frenchman  is  that  he  saw  that 
"the  remotest  parts  of  the  universe"  are  "governed 
by  mechanical  laws,"  including  "our  own  bodily 
frame,"  and  "attempted  for  the  first  tune  to  account 
for  all  natural  phenomena  as  only  a  simple  develop- 
ment of  the  laws  of  mechanics,"  l  "with  the  effect  of 
arriving.  .  .  at  that  purely  mechanical  view  of  vital 
phenomena  towards  which  modern  physiology  is 
striving."  Descartes  had  said  in  his  "Discourse  on 
Method,"  "This  motion  which  I  have  just  explained 
[the  circulation  of  the  blood]  is  as  much  the  necessary 
result  of  the  structure  of  the  parts  which  one  can  see 
in  the  heart,  and  of  the  heat  which  one  may  feel  there 
with  one's  fingers,  and  of  the  nature  of  the  blood, 
which  may  be  experimentally  ascertained,  as  is 
that  of  a  clock  of  the  force,  the  situation,  and  the 
figure  of  its  weight  and  of  its  wheels;"  and  Huxley 
adds,  "Thus  according  to  Descartes  the  animal  body 
is  an  automaton,  which  is  competent  to  perform  all 

1  Cf.  "Method  and  Results,"  lee.  4.  The  last  statement  is  quoted 
approvingly  from  Biot. 

135 


136    RESULTS—EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

the  animal  functions  in  exactly  the  same  way  as  a 
clock  or  any  other  piece  of  mechanism." 

In  this  mechanism  in  the  case  of  man  the  rational 
soul,  according  to  Descartes,  has  "its  principal  seat 
in  the  brain,"  and  takes  "the  place  of  the  engineer" 
in  the  mechanisms  made  by  man.  This  soul  engi- 
neer does  none  of  the  work  of  the  body  machine, 
however,  but,  like  an  ordinary  motorman,  merely 
determines  the  tune,  direction,  and  degree  of  its 
movements.  The  character  and  causes  of  those 
bodily  movements,  such  "as  the  digestion  of  food,  the 
pulsation  of  the  heart  and  the  arteries,  the  nutrition 
and  the  growth  of  the  limbs  .  .  .  the  internal  move- 
ments of  the  appetites  and  passions  .  .  .  these  func- 
tions in  the  machine  naturally  proceed  from  the 
mere  arrangement  of  its  organs,  neither  more  nor 
less  than  do  the  movements  of  a  clock,  or  other 
automaton,  from  that  of  its  weights  and  its  wheels; 
so  that,  as  far  as  these  are  concerned,  it  is  not  neces- 
sary to  conceive  any  other  vegetative  or  sensitive 
soul,  nor  any  other  principle  of  motion  or  of  life,  than 
the  blood  and  the  spirits  agitated  by  the  fire  which 
burns  continually  in  the  heart,  and  which  is  no  wise 
essentially  different  from  all  the  fires  which  exist  in 
inanimate  bodies."  2 

Since  Professor  Huxley's  essay  was  first  published 
the  scientific  appreciation  of  the  idea  of  mechanism, 
and  scientific  confidence  in  it,  have  waxed  rather  than 
waned.  To  the  physical  scientist  to-day  it  is  the 
master  key  to  the  universe.  No  doubt,  like  other 
master  keys,  it  will  not  open  every  lock,  but  he  is  apt 
s  Ibid.,  quoted  from  "Traite  de  THornine." 


MECHANISM  137 

to  think  that  no  lock  really  opens  without  it.  On  the 
other  hand,  these  views  of  men  of  science  are  unwel- 
come to  many  philosophers  and  most  theologians. 
To  them  the  conception  of  nature  as  a  mechanism  is 
at  best  a  superficial  abstraction,  useful  no  doubt  for 
certain  practical  ends,  but  misleading  and  even  debas- 
ing, if  taken  as  a  true  account  of  real  existence.  As  a 
recent  philosopher  expresses  it,  "this  way  ...  lies 
confused  thinking,  nay,  folly."  3  To  call  man  a  ma- 
chine seems  to  such  thinkers  an  impeachment  of  his 
dignity,  a  virtual  denial  of  his  personality  and  higher 
possibilities. 

It  is  evidently  important  to  ascertain  just  what 
the  man  of  science  means — or  should  mean — by  de- 
claring that  all  nature  is  mechanical.  What  is  nec- 
essarily connoted  by  the  term  "mechanism"  as  ap- 
plied to  nature?  If  we  reflect  critically  upon  any 
machine  of  human  construction,  a  locomotive  or  a 
steamship  for  example,  searching  for  the  distinctive 
idea  embodied  in  it  as  a  mechanism,  we  shall  prob- 
ably agree  in  finding  it  first  of  all  in  the  conception 
of  a  more  or  less  unitary  whole  made  up  of  intercon- 
nected parts,  a  whole  in  which  all  the  movements  are 
determined  and  explainable  by  relations  between  the 
parts,  not  through  some  outside  agency.  In  this 
governance  from  within  through  the  action  of  one 
part  upon  another  we  seem  to  have  the  distinction 
between  a  machine  and  a  mere  tool.  A  spade  goes 
into  the  soil  because  the  laborer  holding  it  drives  it 
in;  but  a  steamship  does  not  move  because  any  man 
or  divinity  pushes  it  on.  The  movement  of  a  steam- 
1  Fawcett,  "The  Indiv.  and  Reality,"  p.  92. 


138    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

ship  are  explainable  purely  by  its  structure  as  this 
is  related  to  the  two  elements  in  which  it  moves 
(water  and  air) ;  that  is,  by  factors  (structural  parts 
and  forces)  vrithin  itself. 

A  further  idea  involved  in  the  conception  of  mech- 
anism is  that  the  parts  work  together  without  any 
choice  on  their  part  of  the  ends  served  by  the  mechan- 
ism as  a  whole.  It  is  not  because  rudder  or  screw 
or  any  other  part  of  the  ocean  "liner"  itself  wishes 
and  chooses  to  reach  the  transatlantic  goal  that  it 
directs  its  course  and  the  course  of  the  steamer 
thereto.  Nor  yet  do  all  the  parts  take  counsel  to- 
gether, decide  on  that  goal,  and  then  work  collectively 
toward  it.  In  the  ship's  mechanism  each  part  merely 
does  what  its  nature  under  the  circumstances  leads 
it  to  do;  and  the  outcome,  whether  of  harbor  reached 
or  wreck  met,  is  due  to  the  way  these  parts  are  ad- 
justed, on  the  one  side,  to  one  another  and,  on  the 
other,  to  factors  (winds,  currents,  etc.)  which  bear 
upon  the  complicated  whole  from  without. 

Now,  it  is  the  conviction  of  present-day  natural 
science  that  these  two  ideas,  or  principles,  hold  good 
also  in  all  natural  processes.  A  human  body,  for  ex- 
ample, does  not  go  through  its  multitude  of  remark- 
able activities — digestion,  circulation,  respiration, 
nervous  reactions,  and  so  forth — because  some  intel- 
ligence, some  spiritual  being  or  animal  soul,  dwells 
within  it  and  consciously  keeps  each  organ  doing  its 
part.  No,  the  saliva  flows  to  meet  the  food  taken 
into  the  mouth  because  it  is  the  nature  of  the  salivary 
glands  to  produce  it  under  the  stimulus  of  contact 
with  food,  and  the  ptyalin  ferment  in  the  saliva  acts 


MECHANISM  139 

on  the  starchy  elements  in  the  food  because  it  is  its 
nature,  wherever  found,  to  convert  starch  into  dex- 
trin and  maltose.  That  is,  it  is  a  chemical,  not  a  per- 
sonal, reaction  on  the  part  of  the  ptyalin.  So  with 
the  activity  of  the  stomach;  it  is  not  aroused  to  action 
because  it  wishes  the  incoming  masticated  food  to  be 
churned  up  with  the  gastric  juice  before  passing  it 
on  to  the  intestines.  Its  activity  is  aroused  by  the 
mere  contact  of  that  food.  Apparently,  if  it  could 
be  itself  properly  nourished  and  supported,  it  would 
act  with  equal  efficiency  if  it  were  removed  from  the 
body  and  placed  in  a  glass  vessel.  For  like  reasons 
the  digested  food  is  absorbed  from  the  intestines,  and 
carried  on  to  the  tissues.  So  with  all  the  functions 
of  the  body;  they  go  on  for  reasons  that  are  essen- 
tially the  same  as  those  which  control  the  workings  of 
a  steamship  or  an  automobile.  The  remarkable  re- 
sults in  the  co-working  of  all  the  parts — the  great 
voyages  in  the  case  of  the  ship  and  the  throbbing, 
sensitive  life  in  the  case  of  the  organism — are  due 
apparently,  not  at  all  to  the  rational  choice  of  the 
parts  themselves,  but  to  the  form  of  their  combination 
and  their  adjustment  to  each  other. 

This  seems  to  be  the  substance  of  the  idea  of 
mechanism  as  applied  to  nature.  It  may  be  made 
somewhat  clearer  by  analysis,  for  it  involves  more 
or  less  clearly  five  sub-principles,  namely,  adjust- 
ment, interaction,  continuity,  uniformity,  and  caus- 
ation. 

1.  Adjustment. — A  machine,  or  concrete  mechan- 
ism, is  a  construction,  or  unitary  whole,  in  which  the 
parts  are  of  such  a  character  as  to  be  capable  of  f  unc- 


140    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

tions  of  service  one  to  another  in  behalf  of  some 
established,  or  regularly  effected,  end.  The  parts  of 
a  printing  press,  for  example,  are  not  only  located 
near  each  other — say,  in  the  same  room — but  by 
their  very  position,  shape,  and  composition  are  capa- 
ble of  leading  to  the  production  of  printed  sheets  of 
paper.  Not  any  casual  jumble  of  steel  levers,  cogs  and 
so  forth,  will  print  a  newspaper;  nor  will  the  right 
kind  of  parts  if  they  are  not  properly  placed.  The 
character  of  the  parts  in  these  respects  of  form,  posi- 
tion, and  so  forth,  relative  to  each  other,  is  what  is 
meant  by  their  adjustment.  In  the  case  of  a  printing 
press  the  adjustment  looking  toward  the  printed 
result  is,  of  course,  designed.  The  question  whether 
it  is  designed  or  not  in  the  case  of  natural  mechan- 
isms leads  into  sharply  disputed  philosophic  ground, 
entrance  upon  which  may  well  be  postponed  a  little. 
Certainly  on  applying  to  natural  situations  terms 
taken  from  ordinary  industrial  experience  we  should 
be  on  our  guard  against  assuming  resemblances 
which  may  not  exist.  It  is  sufficient  at  present  to 
note  that  the  principle  of  mechanism  means  that 
nature  is  a  vast  system  of  adjustments  which,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  and  by  established,  orderly  processes, 
do  produce  results  which,  from  the  standpoint  of  our 
human  experience,  are  to  be  expected  from  those 
processes,  and  hence  are  predictable. 

2.  Interaction. — Adjustment  of  parts  would  be  a 
futile  thing  if  the  parts  did  not  act,  and  act  upon 
each  other,  when  the  adjustment  was  effected.  What 
the  railroad  men  call  a  "dead"  locomotive  is  a  case 
in  point.  The  parts,  including  water  and  fuel,  may 


MECHANISM  141 

be  all  present  and  in  position,  but  there  being  no  ac- 
tion of  one  upon  another,  there  is  no  movement  on  the 
part  of  the  engine.4  When  nature  is  described  as  a 
mechanism,  it  is  meant  that  it  is  a  "live,"  not  a 
"dead"  machine;  the  parts  always  do  act  when  the 
proper  adjustments  are  effected. 

In  all  machines  properly  so  called,  that  is,  machines 
that  effect  results,  the  essential  parts  are  active; 
whatever  is  not  so  is  dead  weight,  and  not  essential. 
It  is  only  through  a  figure  of  speech,  which  easily 
runs  into  false  abstraction,  or  the  fallacy  of  simpli- 
fication, that  one  comes  to  regard  the  parts  of  a 
steam-engine,  for  example,  as  inert — mere  passive 
tools  of  a  force  independent  of  them.  Every  mole- 
cule of  the  iron  or  carbon,  if  really  an  integral  part 
of  the  engine,  undergoes  strain,  and  reacts  to  it, 
when  the  engine  as  a  whole  is  working.  Not  a  thrust 
or  a  pull  is  made  but  the  molecular  constituents  of 
the  machine  have  a  part  in  it.  The  molecules  of 
steam  differ  from  those  of  the  inclosing  iron  only  in 
being  active  in  a  non-harmonic  way  and  perhaps  an 
acuter  degree.  This  difference  in  type  of  activity  as 
between  the  solid  and  fluid  parts  seems  to  be  greater 
in  man-made  than  in  natural  mechanisms. 

3.  Continuity. — In  a  machine  the  parts  act  upon 
one  another  and  produce  results  only  when  they  are 
in  contact,  directly  or  indirectly.  They  must  bear 


4  This  is  really  a  case  of  defective  adjustment;  for  the  adjustment 
in  a  locomotive  has  not  been  effected  completely  until  the  fuel  is 
burning  with  the  required  vigor.  A  "dead"  machine  is  always  of 
this  imperfect  character,  for  whenever  the  adjustment  is  complete, 
in  either  man-made  or  natural  mechanisms,  the  parts  act. 


142    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

upon  one  another  in  some  way,  either  by  immediate 
pressure  or  impact,  or  through  one  or  more  connect- 
ing links.  From  end  to  end  of  the  machine  there 
must  be  no  real  gap  in  the  dynamic  continuity,  or 
it  will  not  work;  that  is,  there  is  no  such  thing  hi  a 
machine  as  action  at  a  distance  without  intervening 
medium.  Now,  men  of  science  are  convinced  that 
the  like  is  true  of  natural  processes.  "  Nature  does 
not  work  by  leaps"5  either  in  space  or  time.  How- 
ever seemingly  solitary  the  phenomenon  may  be, 
science  holds  that  inquiry  will  in  time  always  show 
that  it  was  the  result  of  interacting  agencies  adequate 
to  its  effectuation  which  were  all  connected  with  it  in 
a  causal  series  without  break.  If  a  light  flashes 
across  the  "void"  spaces  of  the  heavens,  it  is  not  be- 
cause a  luminous  body  millions  of  miles  distant  can 
directly  affect  our  eyes,  but  because  the  pulsations 
it  starts  in  the  ether  produce  other  pulsations  be- 
yond themselves  and  these  others  still  in  unimagina- 
ble swiftness,  until  the  last  of  the  series  smite  the 
retinas  of  our  eyes.  The  principle  is  equally  valid  in 
the  matter  of  tune.  If  the  sound  of  a  distant  impact 
reaches  us  at  an  appreciable  interval  after  sight  has 
acquainted  us  with  the  event,  it  is  not  because  there 
is  any  interval  in  which  nothing  leading  to  the  sound 
effect  is  going  on,  but  simply  because  the  processes 
(ah*  pulsations)  which  lead  to  the  sensation  of  sound 
move  slower  than  those  which  lead  to  sight,  and 
during  the  interval  have  not  yet  reached  our  ears. 
Tn  both  cases  the  single  items  of  the  processes  are 
connected  with  one  another  in  both  time  and  space 

*  "Natura  non  agil  per  saltum." 


MECHANISM  143 

as  intimately  as  the  links  of  a  chain  or  the  strings  of 
a  net. 

4.  Uniformity. — It  is  an  integral  part  of  our  con- 
ception of  a  mechanism  that  it  should  be  uniform  in 
its  workings.  We  expect  a  machine  as  such  to  do  the 
same  thing  under  the  same  circumstances.  When  it 
fails  to  do  so,  we  count  it  a  defective  machine;  some- 
thing is  wrong  with  it,  probably  with  its  adjustment. 
On  the  other  hand,  we  estimate  its  excellence  largely 
by  this  very  test — whether  it  turns  out  uniform  re- 
sults. It  is  quite  natural  that  we  should  do  so ;  for,  if 
the  action  of  its  several  parts  is  simply  the  expression 
of  their  nature,  their  normal  form  of  activity  under 
the  given  conditions,  they  should  evidently,  since  the 
permanent  mechanism,  or  whole,  keeps  the  conditions 
unchanged,  always  do  the  same  thing.  Natural 
processes,  likewise,  have  come  to  be  regarded  by  the 
man  of  science  with  precisely  this  expectation.  With 
like  conditions,  he  affirms,  like  results  will  always 
issue.  At  the  dawn  of  science  this  expectation  was 
apparently  but  a  hesitating  postulate,  adopted  be- 
cause it  was  needed.  Uniformity  was  an  initial  as- 
sumption full  of  hazard.  But  age-long  observation 
and  the  experimental  research  of  a  multitude  of  in- 
quirers have  so  confirmed  the  original  assumption 
that  it  is  now  regarded  with  all  the  confidence  of  an 
experimentally  discovered  principle. 

It  is  involved  in  the  conception  of  the  uniformity 
of  nature,  at  least  in  its  modern  empirical  form,  that 
natural  agencies  are  determinate;  that  is,  they  have, 
under  given  conditions,  a  definite,  unchanging  mode  of 
behavior.  Whether  this  determination,  and  conse- 


144    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

quently  the  principle  of  uniformity  itself,  are  abso- 
lute, or  only  so  in  the  main,  is  a  vexed  question  of 
philosophy  which  will  be  considered  in  the  next 
chapter.  Science  as  such  is  not  concerned  with  this 
question.  It  assumes  that  its  subject-matter  is  deter- 
mined so  far  as  its  field  goes,  that  is,  so  far  as  empiri- 
cally verifiable  results  are  involved.  Its  assumption 
thus  far  has  worked,  and,  whatever  the  absolute  situ- 
ation, is  likely  to  work  indefinitely  long  in  the  future. 

5.  Causation. — Not  only  is  there  in  a  mechanism 
a  certain  definite,  unchanging  type  of  activity  char- 
acteristic of  each  part;  not  only,  moreover,  are  the 
results  effected  by  the  mechanism  due  to  the  inter- 
action of  the  parts,  but  there  is  also  a  certain  fixed 
type  of  this  interaction.  There  is  an  established  order, 
or  sequence  of  activities.  In  a  steam  engine,  for 
example,  the  regular,  indispensable  order  is,  in  out- 
line,— combustion,  superheated  water,  high  pressure 
vaporization,  admission  of  the  steam  hi  rapid  suc- 
cession to  first  one  side  of  the  piston  and  then  the 
other,  and  so  forth.  It  is  in  this  order  of  internal 
interaction  that  the  steam  engine  works,  and  in  no 
other  order  will  it  produce  its  characteristic  results 
of  strain  and  movement.  It  is  idle  to  try  to  start  the 
piston  before  the  steam  has  been  generated,  and  it 
is  useless  to  open  the  throttle  before  the  water  has 
reached  the  right  temperature.  This  familiar  fact 
may  be  generalized  under  the  statement  that  results 
will  not  appear  until  their  proper  antecedents  are 
present  and  free  to  act. 

This  is  precisely  the  state  of  things  which  men  of 
science  see  in  the  natural  world,  and  which  they  call 


MECHANISM  145 

the  principle  of  causation.  Everywhere  in  nature 
events  occur  in  certain  established  orders  of  sequence. 
This  they  have  found  to  be  so  universally  true  that 
scientists  have  become  fully  convinced  that,  apart 
from  its  proper  antecedents,  or  causes,  no  event 
whatever  takes  place.  In  a  sense  the  established 
antecedent  is  necessary,  or  indispensable,  to  the 
effect,  though  why  it  is  so  we  often  find  it  hard  even 
to  surmise.  Causation  is  thus  for  the  scientist  simply 
one  aspect  of  the  world-wide  mechanism,  the  aspect 
of  invariable  and  apparently  indispensable  sequence. 
It  would  perhaps  not  be  needful  to  say  more  on 
this  point,  were  it  not  that  the  discussions  of  the 
subject  have  been  much  confused  by  the  use  of  the 
word  cause  in  the  popular  sense,  which  is  also  the  older 
sense.  The  notion  of  causation,  as  common  life  and 
the  ethical  and  juridical  ideas  of  responsibility  have 
induced  it  in  us,  roots  in  that  of  personal  agency, 
which  always  includes  the  element  of  power  or  energy. 
For  men  in  ordinary  life, — indeed,  for  all  men  in 
a  multitude  of  practical  situations — to  inquire  into 
the  cause  of  an  event  is  to  ask  what  person  or  power 
brought  it  to  pass.  This  seems  to  be  the  natural 
signification  in  the  case  of  a  crime  or  an  explosion. 
As  most  men  do  not  investigate  deeply,  a  plausible 
answer  to  this  question  is  generally  sufficient.  ~~  But 
science,  with  its  spirit  of  rigor,  has  found  that  a  satis- 
factory answer  to  that  question  is  beyond  its  reach. 
Both  person  and  power  are  terms  shrouded  in  ob- 
scurity. The  law  may  ascertain  the  man  who  "com- 
mitted" a  crime,  and  may  punish  him  for  it;  but 
science  is  not  satisfied  that  "he"  was  the  cause  of  it 


146    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

in  the  sense  implied  in  common  thought,  that  is,  the 
true  originator,  or  source,  of  the  event.  It  finds 
the  man  himself  a  plexus  of  forces,  and  among  these 
are  many  impulses  handed  down  from  past  genera- 
tions or  inbred  by  society.  Where  then  do  the  im- 
pulses which  resulted  in  the  crime  head?  It  does 
not  know.  Such  inquiries  lead  out  beyond  its  present 
pale. 

Science  has  therefore  broken  with  the  ordinary 
notion  of  cause,  retraced  its  steps,  and  decided  to 
confine  its  inquiries  to  the  ascertainable.  It  is 
content  to  ask  for  the  invariable  and  apparently 
indispensable  antecedent  of  the  event,  being  con- 
vinced that  the  knowledge  of  such  antecedent  will 
give  ability  to  predict,  and  often  to  control,  the 
event,  and  not  improbably  be  of  more  practical  value 
than  a  knowledge  of  the  absolute  source  of  the  factors 
involved  in  it.  This  indispensable  antecedent  it 
calls  by  the  old  word  "cause,"  unhappily  at  the 
cost  of  no  little  ambiguity.  Causes  are,  indeed,  the 
great  objectives  of  science;  but  it  is  not  causes  in  the 
sense  of  original  sources  of  phenomena,  but  causes  in 
the  sense  of  indispensable  cogs  in  the  mechanism  by 
means  of  which  phenomena  appear.  Thus,  the 
scientific  cause  of  an  explosion  is  the  immediately 
pre-existent  situation,  such  as  the  presence  of  a  highly 
organized  compound  or  mixture  in  unstable  equilib- 
rium conjoined  with  an  interacting  agent,  perhaps 
trivial  in  itself,  which  destroys  the  equilibrium. 
Science  calls  such  an  antecedent  situation  the  cause 
because  it  is  indispensable  to  the  effect.  Common 
thought,  on  the  other  hand,  if  penetrating  enough, 


MECHANISM  147 

would  locate  the  cause  in  certain  forces  believed  to 
reside  in  the  compound. 

There  is  a  disposition  on  the  part  of  some  writers 
to  condemn  the  popular  and  older  notion  of  cause 
as  an  illegitimate  one,  but  without  sufficient  reason. 
It  is  probably  true  that  at  present  it  is  not  a  scientific 
concept;  but  there  appears  to  be  nothing  illegitimate 
about  it.  It  answers  to  a  natural  human  interest, 
the  desire  to  penetrate  to  the  sources  of  things. 
Indeed,  it  seems  to  be  a  phase  of  the  contemplative 
interest  in  mechanism,  a  craving  to  follow  the 
perpetually  changing  stream  of  things  back  to  its 
origins;  in  other  words,  to  witness  the  whole  of 
the  process.  It  is  much  truer  to  say  that  the  two 
concepts  of  cause  relate  to  different  aspects  of  nature, 
the  scientific  to  the  more  immediate  and  verifiable 
factors  productive  of  change,  the  popular — which 
might  also  be  called  the  philosophic — concept  to 
the  more  ultimate  factors.  The  one  emphasizes  the 
sequential  aspect  of  nature,  the  other  the  dynamic. 

To  summarize  the  results  of  our  analysis  of  the 
idea  of  mechanism  as  a  principle  of  science  it  appears 
that  it  stands  for  the  conception  tfiat  nature  is  an 
established,  working,  comprehensible  order,  something 
organized  and  regular,  active  and  efficient,  something 
which  can  be  understood  through  the  analogies  of 
human  activities  and  human  devices.  It  seems  to 
be  true,  however,  that  to  individual  scientists,  and 
still  more  to  certain  philosophers,  the  term  mechan- 
ism has  special  metaphysical  connotations. 

Mechanism  and  Materialism. — One  of  the  most 
common  of  these  further  meanings  is  that  of  blind 


148    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

momentum,  mass  and  motion  each  of  the  simplest 
kind,  as  the  one  agency  of  control  in  the  universe. 
This  notion  generally  involves  the  idea  that 
the  parts  which  constitute  the  mechanism  of  nature 
are  dead,  inactive  pawns  pushed  about  either 
by  the  impact  of  other  such  pawns  or  by  unknown 
and  blind  forces.  This  is  essentially  the  older 
materialism,  a  kind  of  apotheosis  of  push.  But  this 
special,  metaphysical  conception  of  mechanism  is 
by  no  means  involved  in  the  term.  It  is  one  very 
difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  apply  to  the  phenomena 
of  biology,  or  even  to  those  of  chemistry.  Further- 
more, the  terms  mechanism  and  machine  are  freely 
used  in  common  speech  for  organizations  hi  which 
the  units,  or  parts,  are  active  and  even  conscious. 
Thus,  the  phrases  "mechanism  of  trade"  and  " mech- 
anism of  exchange"  are  common  and  natural; 
armies — those  of  Cromwell  and  Napoleon,  for 
example — have  been  described  as  machines;  and 
who  has  not  heard  of  the  political  machine?  It 
is  the  belief  of  the  panpsychist  school  of  philosophers 
that  every  molecule  and  atom — one  of  steel,  for 
example — has  a  psychic  or  quasi-conscious  side. 
Should  it  prove  that  they  are  right,  it  does  not  appear 
that  a  steam  engine  or  a  dynamo  would  be  any  the 
less  a  mechanism  on  that  account.  The  cells  of  a 
living  body  have  each  their  own  life,  with  its  birth, 
nutrition,  decay,  and  death,  and  they  may  have, 
also,  an  elementary  grade  of  consciousness;  but 
neither  of  these  higher  characteristics  prevents 
them  from  being  integral  parts  of  the  body,  which 
itself  is  evidently  a  mechanism,  a  kind  of  heat 


MECHANISM  149 

engine.  The  essential  nature  of  a  mechanism  is  not 
to  be  found  in  the  idea  that  its  parts  are  simple, 
inactive,  and  impotent,  but  in  the  fact  that  they 
are  uniform  in  function  and  so  adjusted  to  one  an- 
other that  their  combined  functionings  produce  regu- 
larly effected,  and  so  predictable  and  controllable, 
results. 

Fallacy  of  Simplification. — Having  seen  how  many 
pitfalls  beset  the  path  of  constructive  thought,  it 
will  not  surprise  us  to  find  one  lying  close  even  to 
the  very  helpful  concept  of  mechanism.  Many  a 
radical  mechanist  has  fallen  into  it.  The  fallacy 
of  simplification  consists  hi  assuming  that,  when  a 
natural  mechanism  has  been  traced  out  and  described 
the  phenomena  characteristic  of  it  have  been  fully 
set  forth  and  accounted  for.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
however  true  and  valuable  the  mechanical  descrip- 
tion may  be,  it  is  after  all  an  account  of  part  of  the 
facts,  not  of  the  whole  of  them.6  To  assume  the 
contrary  is  to  forget  that  a  mechanical  description 
is  necessarily  in  general  terms,  and  that  the  more 

•Cf.  the  remark  of  Mach,  "Purely  mechanical  phenomena  do 
not  exist  ...  are  abstractions,  made,  either  intentionally  or  from 
necessity,  for  facilitating  our  comprehension  of  things.  The  science 
of  mechanics  does  not  comprise  the  foundations,  no,  nor  even  a  part 
of  the  world,  but  only  an  aspect  of  it."  "A  person  who  knew  the 
world  only  through  the  theatre,  if  brought  behind  the  scenes  and  per- 
mitted to  view  the  mechanism  of  the  stage's  action  might  possibly 
believe  that  the  real  world,  also,  was  in  need  of  a  machine  room,  and 
that,  if  this  were  once  thoroughly  explored,  we  should  know  all. 
Similarly  we,  too,  should  beware  lest  the  intellectual  machinery  em- 
ployed in  the  representation  of  the  world  on  the  stage  of  thought  be 
regarded  as  the  basis  of  the  real  world."  ("Science  of  Mechanics," 
chap.  V,  pt.  2.) 


150    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

immediate  and  peculiar  features  of  the  object  under 
inquiry  are  abstracted  from  and  not  included  in  it. 
A  description  in  terms  of  adjustment,  motion,  number, 
order,  and  so  forth,  is  the  kind  of  description  that 
will  apply  to  multitudes  of  cases,  and  which  therefore 
must  omit  what  is  distinctive  of  those  cases  taken 
singly.  Especially  does  it  fail  to  do  justice  to  the 
data,  its  interest  being  in  the  relations,  not  in  the 
elementary  facts;  and  no  complete  account  of  a 
connected  body  of  phenomena  is  given  so  long  as 
the  arrangement  and  actions  of  the  parts  are  de- 
scribed, but  the  source  and  ground  of  the  activities 
of  those  parts  is  left  unrevealed.  Thus,  a  biologist, 
confronted  as  he  is  with  phenomena  that  are  enor- 
mously complex,  naturally  gives  his  first  attention 
to  those  features  that  are  comparable  with  other 
natural  processes — the  mechanical  features.  These 
he  finds  at  once  comprehensible  and  surprisingly 
open  to  discovery  and  precise  description.  En- 
couraged by  this  important  fact,  he  naturally  looks 
forward  to  the  time  when  such  ascertainment  of 
mechanical  processes  will  be  complete;  and,  if  he  is 
not  on  his  guard,  he  is  likely  to  forget  that  he  is 
dealing  with  an  abstracted,  not  an  actual,  situation, 
and  to  think  and  maintain  that  then,  when  the  last 
computation  has  been  made,  he  will  have  a  complete 
account  of  the  phenomena  before  him.  But  surely 
he  will  have  nothing  of  the  kind,  however  valuable 
and  true  his  results.  To  catalogue  all  the  groupings 
and  movements  of  cells,  and  the  external,  or  me- 
chanical, conditions  therefor,  is  not  in  the  last 
analysis  to  tell  why  a  cell  does  anything  at  all. 


MECHANISM  151 

It  may  be  objected  that  to  raise  such  an  ultimate 
question  as  that  is  unreasonable,  since  explanation 
has  to  do  only  with  the  inter-relationships  of  the 
fundamental  data  of  experience,  not  with  the  origin 
and  ground  of  the  data.  The  elements  of  knowledge, 
the  "brute  facts"  of  experience,  are  not  open  to 
explanation;  if  they  were,  they  would  not  be  the 
fundamental  data  that  they  actually  are.  The 
reply  is  largely  just;  but  it  only  re-enforces  the  point 
made  hi  the  raising  of  the  question  objected  to, 
the  point  that  no  description  of  mechanism  is  ever  a 
full  account  of  the  segment  of  existence  with  which 
it  deals.  To  the  mechanical  interest  the  ultimate 
data  are  points  of  departure  not  disclosure — in  a 
sense  secondary  matters.  Furthermore,  it  is  not 
true  that,  when  mechanical  explanation  has  done 
its  best,  there  is  never  any  further  explanation  to  be 
given  of  the  functioning  of  an  organized  bit  of 
nature.  We  still  have  in  all  living  forms  the  important 
factor  of  value',  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  this 
factor  may  account  for  functionings  of  a  cell,  or 
even  of  a  molecule,  before  which  mechanical  ex- 
planation is  dumb. 

EXERCISES 

1.  Describe  in  detail  the  process  of  digestion,  and  show  its 
mechanical  aspects. 

2.  Do  the  same  with  the  circulatory  system  of  any  warm- 
blooded animal. 

3.  Point  out  all  the  essential  characteristics  of  a  mechanism 
referred  to  in  Hough  and  Sedgwick's,  "Human  Mechanism," 
chaps.  I  and  IV. 


152    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

4.  Make  a  careful  summary  of  Huxley's  essay  on  "Animal 
Automatism"  (Cf.  "Method  and  Results,"  essay  V),  pointing 
out  all  the  considerations  which  warrant  the  description  of  a 
human  body  as  a  mechanism. 

5.  Summarize  carefully  Hume's  account  of  what  he  holds  to 
be  the  true  conception  of  cause  ("Enquiry,"  etc.,  sec.  7,  pt.  2) 
in  its  two  aspects,  and  contrast  it  critically  with  the  main  idea  of 
cause  that  actuates  detectives  in  their  work,  as,  for  example,  in 
the  investigation  of  the  dynamiting  of  the  Los  Angeles  news- 
paper office. 


CHAPTER  IX 
LAW— VALUES 

Hume  in  his  famous  essay  on  miracles  relates  the 
case  of  a  man  in  Saragossa,  Spain,  seen  by  Cardinal 
de  Retz,  "who  had  served  seven  years  as  a  door- 
keeper [in  the  cathedral],  and  was  well  known  to 
everybody  in  town  that  had  ever  paid  his  devotions 
at  that  church.  He  had  been  seen  for  so  long  a  tune 
wanting  a  leg,  but  recovered  that  limb  by  the  rubbing 
of  holy  oil  upon  the  stump;  and  the  cardinal  assures 
us  that  he  saw  him  with  two  legs.  This  miracle  was 
vouched  for  by  all  the  canons  of  the  church,  and  the 
whole  company  in  town  were  appealed  to  for  a  con- 
firmation of  the  fact,  whom  the  cardinal  found  by 
their  zealous  devotion  to  be  thorough  believers  of 
the  miracle."  Hume  notes  that  de  Retz  himself 
was  "of  an  incredulous  and  libertine  character," 
and  so  not  prejudiced  hi  favor  of  the  event,  which 
itself  was  also  "of  so  singular  a  nature  as  would 
scarcely  admit  of  a  counterfeit,  and  witnesses  very 
numerous,  and  all  of  them  in  a  manner  spectators  of 
the  fact,"  so  that  we  seem  to  be  presented  with  a 
remarkably  well  attested  miracle.  Nevertheless, 
Hume  holds  that  the  story  is  not  to  be  believed. 
He  cannot  account  for  it,  but  as  a  miracle,  it  is 
necessarily  a  "violation  of  the  laws  of  nature," 
and  hence  incredible.  This  is  substantially  the 
153 


154    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

view  of  men  of  science  to-day:  a  violation  of  natural 
law  is  not  to  be  credited. 

Now,  what  are  these  laws  of  nature  which  are  to 
be  trusted  in  preference  even  to  unanimous  testimony 
and  to  what  seems  the  clear  evidence  of  the  senses? 
Obviously,  for  one  thing,  they  are  ideas1  not  facts, 
principles — mind-made  bits  of  knowledge — not  ex- 
periences, for  they  are  never  perceived  by  the  senses. 
The  vast  majority  of  those  who  have  lived  upon  the 
earth,  however  keen  then*  vision  and  hearing  and 
other  senses,  have  never  known  them  at  all.  More- 
over, they  are  empirical  principles;  they  are  always 
the  fruits  of  experience,  generally  of  experience  due 
to  deliberate  inquiry,  and  are  neither  ways  of  study- 
ing nature,  nor  necessary  assumptions  made  at  the 
outset. 

This  was  as  far  as  Hume  was  willing  to  go.  For 
him  the  laws  of  nature  were  simply  statements  of 
the  way  that  natural  processes  are,  in  our  unbroken 
or  total  experience,  actually  found  to  take  place. 
Just  on  this  fact,  namely,  that  they  are  drawn 
from  and  supported  by  the  totality  of  our  experience, 
he  founded  his  well  known  argument  against  the 
miraculous.  Miracles,  being  at  best  drawn  from  a 
part,  and  generally  a  very  small  part,  of  human  ex- 
perience, are  not  to  be  received  in  defiance  of  the 
totality  of  our  experience  as  expressed  in  natural 
law.  Now,  Hume's  conception  of  law  is  substantially 
that  of  science.  It  has  discovered,  as  we  have  seen,2 
that  natural  agents,  factors,  and  elements,  at  least 
so  far  as  they  are  mechanical,  are  determinate;  that 

1  Cf.  p.  24,  supra.  •  Cf.  p.  143,  supra. 


LAW— VALUES  155 

is,  possess  a  characteristic,  constant  way  of  behaving. 
They  can  be  relied  upon  to  act  in  these  ways  (under 
proper  conditions)  both  in  the  present  and  the  future. 
Moreover,  these  ways  are  often  the  same,  or  indis- 
tinguishably  similar,  as  regards  a  vast  number  of 
individuals,  so  that  any  one  of  these  constitutes  a 
type  of  the  rest.  When  these  typical  determinations, 
or  fixed  forms  of  functioning,  especially  those  which 
prevail  on  a  wide  scale,3  are  described  succinctly, 
we  have  what  science  calls  a  law.4 

The  Reign  of  Law  Accounted  for. — For  science, 
then,  the  word  law  stands  for  a  statement  of  certain 
of  nature's  determinations,  or  fixed  types  of  behavior; 
and  the  phrase,  "reign  of  law,"  is  merely  a  meta- 
phorical term  for  the  principle  that  the  world  is 
determinate  in  wholesale,  typical  ways.5  It  is 
common,  however,  to  carry  this  subject  from  the 
field  of  science  over  into  that  of  philosophy,  and  to 
seek  a  reason  or  ground  for  nature's  determinations. 
As  to  this  inquiry  three  leading  views  dispute  the 

J  It  would  not  be  improper,  however,  to  speak  of  the  description 
of  the  established  functioning  of  a  unique  individual  as  the  law  of 
its  nature. 

4  Cf.  A.  L.  Jones,  "Logic,"  etc.,  p.  8,  "A  law  in  the  field  of  science 
is  a  statement  of  the  way  in  which  things  do  invariably  behave." 
This  is  better  than  F.  T.  Weil's  formula,  that  "a  law  in  science  is  a 
statement  of  how,  under  specific  conditions,  a  thing  invariably  does 
and  must  act";  for  in  the  latter  definition  the  word  "must"  cannot 
be  proved.  It  is  philosophical  perhaps,  but  not  scientific. 

«  Cf.  Wheetham,  "The  Recent  Develop,  of  Phys.  Science,"  p.  31: 
"Many  brave  things  have  been  written,  and  many  capital  letters 
expended  in  describing  the  Reign  of  Law.  The  laws  of  nature, 
however,  when  the  mode  of  their  discovery  is  analyzed,  are  seen  to 
be  merely  the  most  convenient  way  of  stating  the  results  of  ex- 
perience in  a  form  suitable  for  future  reference,"  etc. 


156    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

pre-eminence.  (1)  The  first  is  that  of  absolute 
determination,  which  may  well  be  distinguished  by 
the  old  Democritan  term,  necessity.  Necessity,  in 
this  connection,6  means  movement  impelled  entirely 
from  behind,  so-called  blind  impulse,  action  regard- 
less of  consequences.  It  is  the  type  of  activity  that 
seems  to  be  present  in  all  inorganic  mass  movements, 
from  the  tornado  to  the  explosion  in  a  rifle  or  the 
action  of  a  poison.  The  motivation  is,  so  to  speak, 
entirely  from  behind;  what  is  in  front,  that  is,  in 
view  or  to  follow,  has  no  influence.  The  agent  acts 
in  the  given  way  "necessarily,"  because  it  knows  no 
other  way  to  act ;  in  fact  it  knows  nothing  at  all.  The 
"necessity"  of  such  mass  movements  probably 
impresses  us  most  in  the  aspect  of  complete  indiffer- 
ence to  human  interests  which  inorganic  nature  so 
often  wears,  as  in  shipwrecks,  conflagrations,  the 
earthquakes  at  San  Francisco  and  Messina,  and  the 
volcanic  eruption  on  the  island  of  Martinique. 

"Streams  will  not  curb  their  pride 
The  just  man  not  to  entomb, 
Nor  lightnings  go  aside, 

*  Like  most  philosophical  terms  the  word  necessity  is  equivocal. 
It  often  stands  for  a  felt  physical  compulsion,  force  exerted  more 
or  less  against  the  will  of  the  one  acted  upon.  As  such  Professor  Hux- 
ley scouts  it,  holding  that  the  idea  is  an  intruder  in  physical  science. 
To  Hume  it  seems  to  have  meant  the  logical  or  psychological  pres- 
sure that  obliges  one  to  accept  a  conclusion  involved  in  the  premises. 
As  such  he  argues  at  length  and  cogently  against  its  admission  into 
our  knowledge  of  matters  of  fact.  There  is  nothing  necessary  about 
these,  he  holds;  they  might  quite  as  well,  for  all  we  can  see,  have 
been  otherwise  than  what  they  are  ("Enquiry  concerning  the  Hum. 
Understand."  Sees.  IV  and  VII).  The  meaning  discussed  in  the 
text  is  the  one  which  has  been  most  prominent  hi  philosophy. 


LAW— VALUES  157 

To  give  his  virtues  room; 

Nor  is  that  wind  less  rough  that  blows  a  good  man's  barge." 

That  this  is  an  important  aspect  of  existence  is 
obvious;  but  is  it  the  one  and  only  true  aspect, 
compared  with  which  all  differing  aspects  are  but 
seeming?  If,  as  is  often  the  case,  one  answers  this 
question  in  the  affirmative,  and  assumes  that  ne- 
cessity is  the  truest  expression  of  the  nature  of  things, 
then  he  will  naturally  account  for  the  "reign  of 
law"  by  saying  that  the  determinations  of  things 
set  forth  in  natural  laws  are  eternal  and  absolute, 
and  are  to  be  accepted  as  brute  facts  that  are  neither 
explainable  nor  in  need  of  explanation.  He  will  hold 
that  at  bottom  things  always  were  what  they  are  now. 
The  only  change  has  been  in  then*  combinations, 
and  these  come  about  solely  through  earlier  move- 
ments of  theirs  which  in  turn  were  the  necessary  out- 
come of  their  fixed  nature.  What  they  do  is  done 
because  they  must  do  it,  and  nothing  else  is  possible 
to  them  until  external  conditions  change.  Never 
will  they  do  anything  but  what  under  identical 
conditions  they  have  always  done. 

For  the  physicist  this  is  no  doubt  the  easiest 
explanation.  It  is  a  difficult  one  to  apply,  however, 
in  the  biological  sciences;  for  the  reason  that  living 
things,  especially  those  capable  of  voluntary  action, 
evidently  act  in  view  of  results — things  in  front 
(in  the  future) .  A  king-fisher  pounces  upon  a  minnow 
and  a  fox  upon  a  rabbit,  not  because  either  of  them  is 
pushed  on  from  behind,  but  because  each  is  eager 
for  the  coveted  food.  So  characteristic  is  this  of 
organic  nature  that  when  we  raise  the  question,  why, 


158    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

regarding  any  action  of  the  organism,  whether  the 
course  of  a  statesman  or  the  movements  of  an  ant, 
or  even  the  functionings  of  a  specialized  organ  such 
as  an  eye  or  an  ear,  it  is  not  generally  to  find  out  the 
mechanical  antecedents  of  the  event,  but  to  learn 
what  are  the  satisfactory  results  which  justify  that 
action  and  which  in  conscious  activity,  prompt  it. 

Moreover,  not  a  few  dissent  from  the  doctrine  of 
necessity,  or  utter  determinism,  on  logical  grounds. 
It  is  objected  that  the  doctrine  puts  arbitrary  limits 
upon  the  field  of  inquiry.  Why  assume  that  the 
elemental  characteristics  of  existence  had  no  genesis 
or  history;  and  that  complexity  is  eternal?  It  is  a 
familiar  fact  that  on  the  empirical  plane  all  living 
things  grow  and  acquire  character;  why  not,  also, 
things  on  the  conceptual  or  molecular  plane?  Is  it 
urged  that  it  is  because  they  are  not  living?  But  how 
do  we  know  that?  May  they  not  be  in  a  sense  alive,7 
and  may  not  their  determinations  be  acquired  char- 
acteristics, habits  of  activity  formed  in  the  slow 
lapse  of  ages?  And  if  so,  may  not  some  parts8  of 
existence  be  still  indeterminate,  and  certain  of  the 
highest  parts,  the  personal  for  example,  even  never 
become  wholly  determinate? 

Necessity  and  Naturalism. — The  doctrine  of 
necessity  is  maintained  mostly  by  adherents  of  the 
metaphysical  doctrine  of  naturalism.  This  is  the 
theory  that  whatever  takes  place  in  the  world  is 
due  primarily  and  chiefly  to  the  inherent  nature  of 

7  Cf .  p.  165,  infra. 

•These  might  be  relatively  few  and  quantitatively  small,  and 
yet  be  dynamically  of  great  importance. 


LAW— VALUES  159 

the  agents  involved,  not  to  any  control  external  to 
them.  Naturalism  recognizes  fully,  of  course,  that 
the  action  of  one  substance  or  individual  affects  or 
conditions  the  action  of  other  objects  with  which  it  is 
in  some  kind  of  contact,  direct  or  mediate;  but  it 
denies,  or  at  least  refuses  to  admit  the  need  of  sup- 
posing, that  any  single  intelligent  agency,  and  es- 
pecially any  immaterial  agency,  is  in  full  control  of 
all  the  objects  of  the  world.  Whatever  things  do,  it 
maintains,  is  owing  to  what  they  are;  the  event  is 
always  the  resultant  of  the  natural  forces,  physical 
and  mental,  that  are  in  the  objects  concerned.  Thus, 
according  to  naturalism,  when  a  man  goes  insane 
we  are  not  to  attribute  the  untoward  event  to  the 
will  of  God,9  nor  to  the  invasion  of  his  body  by  a 
demon,10  but  are  to  look  for  explanation  of  it  to  the 
neural  structure  of  the  man  himself  as  this  has 
been  affected  and  conditioned  by  the  circumstances 
(physical,  social,  etc.)  of  his  life.  It  is  evident  that 
naturalism  in  this  sense — a  confident  reference  of 
events  to  the  natures  of  things — is  very  characteristic 
of  men  of  science. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  appears  to  be  a  metaphysical 
motive,  and  not  any  scientific  need,  which  leads  some 
thinkers  to  carry  naturalism  to  the  extreme  form  of 
the  doctrine  of  necessity.  That  all  substances  and 
all  individuals  act,  under  given  conditions,  according 
to  their  natures,  rather  than  merely  or  chiefly  under 

•  Cf.  1  Samuel  16: 14,  15,  23;  18: 10.  The  explanation  of  the  ab- 
solute idealist  seema  to  amount  to  much  the  same  thing  as  the 
above,  though  of  course  in  a  much  less  naive  way. 

10  Cf.  Luke  8: 27-33. 


160    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

the  purposing  agency  of  some  higher  power  may  be 
exceedingly  probable;  yet  at  the  same  tune  their 
activity  may  be  in  some  directions — perhaps  in 
many — far  from  blind  and  regardless  of  consequences. 
The  flow  of  blood  in  an  animal  from  a  fatal  cut  seems 
to  be  a  case  of  purely  necessitated  action;  it  moves 
regardless  of  consequences.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
ordinary  functions  of  the  white  corpuscles  in  the 
blood — the  phagocytes — seem  to  be  distinctly  in- 
telligent and  purposive,  albeit  due  no  doubt  to  their 
nature.  They  seek  and  hunt  down  the  harmful 
microbes  in  the  blood  stream  much  as  cats  extermi- 
nate mice.  So  naturalism  may  be  true  and  the 
philosophic  notion  of  necessity  not  true;  that  is, 
necessitated  activity  may  be  but  one  form  or  phase 
of  natural  activity,  the  form  or  phase  which  is  es- 
pecially characteristic  of  mass  movements,  or  non- 
individual  activities. 

(2)  A  second  view — also  a  heritage  from  antiquity 
— puts  a  somewhat  similar  n  conception  into  dualistic 
form.  It  is  the  idea,  usually  associated  with  the 
name  of  Plato,  that  natural  laws  are  fixed  factors  of 
control  in  the  world,  but  are  in  a  sense  distinct  and 
separate  from  the  objects  which  they  control.  They 
are  not  gods,  not  being  conscious  or  purposeful,  but 
are  godlike,  since  they  are  supreme,  immaterial,  and 
eternal.  Plato  felt,  with  the  more  serious  men  of  his 
time  and  of  the  preceding  Periclean  epoch,  that  there 
must  be  somewhere  a  changeless  basis  to  things; 
something  must  be  eternal.  Yet  he  could  find  that 
unchanging  basis  nowhere  in  what  could  be  seen  or 
u  /. «.,  deterministic. 


LAW— VALUES  161 

touched  or  heard.  On  the  other  hand,  he  noted  that 
the  types  of  the  changing  objects  of  nature — trees, 
animals,  and  so  forth — appeared  to  be  constant. 
He  drew  the  conclusion  that  the  unchanging  eternal 
basis  which  he  sought  was  an  order  of  immaterial 
types  which  somehow  controlled  matter  and  fash- 
ioned it  into  their  likeness.  His  view  as  to  how  this 
fashioning  was  effected  was  one  not  generally  accept- 
able now  to  those  who  magnify  the  reign  of  law,  be- 
ing that  of  final  instead  of  efficient  causes;  but  the 
conception  itself,  that  natural  laws  are  not  only 
descriptions  of  nature's  established  modes  of  behav- 
ior, but  are  in  some  way  quasi-controlling  agencies, 
seems  to  be  prevalent  still.  To  many  minds  they 
seem  to  constitute  a  kind  of  invisible,  immaterial 
framework  (or  complicated  railroad  track)  of  the 
universe,  guiding  all  its  events.12  This  view  is  no 
doubt  a  legitimate  philosophical  conception;  but  it 
should  not,  as  is  often  the  case,  be  presented  in  the 
mask  of  a  scientific  generalization. 

(3)  The  third  view  is  the  theological,  and  is  per- 
haps the  most  ancient  of  all.  It  is  the  theory  that 
natural  laws  are  simply  the  decrees  of  the  Creator  and 
supreme  Ruler  of  the  universe,  expressions  of  un- 
changing divine  will.  This  is  the  view  which  keeps 
closest  to  the  original  signification  of  the  word  law; 
for  law  is  primarily  the  fixed  and  authenticated  will 
of  an  established  authority.  As  soon  as  the  will  of 
the  tribe,  the  monarch,  or  the  parliament  is  in  some 

"This  was  evidently  the  conception  of  Descartes  (cf.  p.  95, 
supra,  and  "Method,"  Pt.  V),  except  that  he  regarded  these  self- 
acting  laws  as  instituted  by  personal,  that  is  divine,  authority. 


162    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

way  published  as  a  regulation  applicable  on  all 
occasions  of  a  given  kind,  it  becomes  law.  From  this 
original,  and  still  common,  meaning  the  idea  of  nat- 
ural law  doubtless  sprang.  The  uniformities  in  na- 
ture came  in  time  to  be  regarded  as  due  to  the  fact 
that  the  gods  had  established  a  certain  order  to  which 
they  themselves  conformed  and  to  which  they  com- 
pelled natural  objects  to  conform;  that  is,  govern- 
ment by  natural  law  then  meant  that  the  gods  con- 
trolled the  world  in  accordance  with  their  fixed  decrees.13 
This  is  evidently  a  perfectly  self -consistent  and  legiti- 
mate conception;  but  however  useful  it  may  still  be 
in  philosophy,  in  explanation  of  the  aspects  of  unity 
and  purposefulness  which  natural  law  often  bears,  it 
renders  little  if  any  service  hi  science.  It  suggests  no 
means,  no  mechanism,  by  which  the  divine  decrees 
pass  into  execution;  nor  is  one  phenomenon  thereby 
distinguished  from  another,  since  all  things  alike  act 
as  they  do  because  "God  wills  it."  14 

One's  decision  between  these  competing  views  is 
likely  to  be  decided  by  individual  inclination  and 
type  of  thought.  Only  one  thing  further  need  be 
said:  No  one  of  them  is  entitled  to  wear  the  garb  of 
science.  All  are  philosophical  interpretations.  It 
is  hi  none  of  these  senses  that  science  teaches  that 
the  world  is  governed  by  law;  but  merely  in  the 
strictly  metaphorical  one,  that  things  actually  behave 
as  though  they  were  subject  to  inflexible  rules.  For 
present-day  science  the  real  agents  are  the  things 

"So  Cleanthes,  the  Stoic,  exclaimed,  "O  Zeus,  in  conformity  to 
law  dost  thou  conduct  all  things." 
14  A  favorite  Mohammedan  saying. 


LAW— VALUES  163 

which  "behave."  If  natural  law  is  a  mere  descrip- 
tion of  that  behavior,  it  is  evident  that  it  cannot 
literally  govern  anything.  The  universe  is  not  con- 
trolled by  any  kind  of  description.  As  well  might 
the  painter  of  a  battle  scene  claim  to  be  the  victo- 
rious general  in  command. 

Final  Causes. — It  has  been  noted  that  the  conduct 
of  living  things  is  largely  directed  by  regard  for  re- 
sults. Such  inciting  results,  now  commonly  known 
as  values,  were  formerly  called  "final  causes."  The 
term  is  not  without  its  propriety,  for  they  certainly 
seem  to  be  causes  in  the  popular  sense  of  productive 
agencies,  and  they  are  final  in  the  sense  that  when 
established  the  mind  asks  nothing  more  in  that  direc- 
tion. Whatever  is  good,  that  is,  gives  satisfaction 
or  pleasure,  is  its  own  warrant  for  being.  Why  do 
men  seek  money  or  distinction?  Just  so  far  as  these 
ends  appear  to  satisfy  the  needs  and  cravings  of 
their  nature,  just  so  far  do  we  feel  that  a  sufficient 
reason  has  been  found. 

We  come,  however,  upon  a  sharp  conflict  of  opinion 
when  we  raise  the  question  whether  final  causes, 
which  are  so  potent  in  men  and  animals,  are  also 
actual  dynamics  (effective  agencies)  in  other  parts 
of  nature;  whether,  for  example,  regard  for  conse- 
quences has  any  place  hi  the  functionings  of  mole- 
cules at  the  one  extreme,  or  the  development  of  the 
universe  at  the  other.15  The  older  materialism 
scouted  the  notion,  and  impeached  it  even  as  regards 
living  beings.  From  its  point  of  view,  "necessity" 

18  Cf.  This  second  aspect  of  the  question  must  be  left  for  Part  III ; 
cf.  infra,  Chapter  XII. 


164    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

was  the  sole  efficient  agency,  or  dynamic,  in  the 
cosmos;  and  to  call  an  organism  a  machine,  whether 
animal  or  man,  was  to  declare  that  it  was  driven 
wholly  from  behind.  All  natural  processes,  it 
maintained,  were  entirely  fortuitous  as  regards 
the  future,  though  completely  determined  (neces- 
sitated) as  regards  the  past.  In  this  contention 
materialism  clearly  went  too  far.  Life  is  too  mani- 
festly teleological — directed  toward  ends — for  such  a 
denial. 

Life. — To  except  living  things,  however,  from  the 
reign  of  necessity  obliges  the  older  view  to  posit  a 
great  schism  in  nature,  a  gulf  between  the  radically 
distinct  kingdoms  of  the  organic  and  the  inorganic, 
the  one  being  characterized  by  the  presence  of  life 
and  its  dynamic  of  value  (final  cause)  and  the  other 
by  the  absence  of  these.  Life  on  this  hypothesis  is 
a  most  mysterious  and  baffling  factor.  It  seems  to  be 
a  godlike  agency  which  takes  the  blind  materials 
and  products  of  the  inorganic  world,  and  fashions 
them  into  intelligent,  eager,  sensitive  beings  far  more 
removed  from  then*  constituent  materials  than  a 
steamship  is  from  a  mass  of  bog-iron  ore.  Plant  life 
lays  hold  upon  such  elementary  substances  as  oxygen, 
hydrogen,  nitrogen,  and  carbon  builds  these  up  into 
tissues  which  animal  life  is  able  to  transform  into 
oxen  and  horses,  lions  and  men.  Yet  once  there  was 
no  hint  nor  germ  of  it  in  all  the  physical  universe. 
At  some  point  in  the  cosmic  process  the  wondrous, 
artistic  agency  suddenly  appeared;  but  how?  and 
whence?  Not  by  magic  surely,  nor  by  any  other 
breach  of  continuity;  was  it,  then,  by  importation 


LAW— VALUES  165 

from  an  immaterial  world?  Such  a  possibility  the 
true  materialist,  and  indeed  the  man  of  science,  are 
very  loath  to  admit. 

Of  late  another  view  has  been  growing  in  favor. 
It  is  suggested  by  the  oft-quoted  remark  of  Profes- 
sor Tyndall  that  matter,  so-called  "inanimate  mat- 
ter," contains  "the  promise  and  potency  of  all 
terrestrial  life."  It  regards  the  organic  domain  as 
simply  a  more  complex  and  more  advanced  stage  of 
the  so-called  inorganic.  In  it  (the  organic  world)  arje 
manifested  factors  and  tendencies  which  are  pres- 
ent, at  least  in  a  rudimentary  way  (in  potency  if 
not  in  actuality  )in  all  existence.  According  to  this 
view,  all  nature,  so  far  as  it  is  individuated,  is,  not 
merely  organized,  but  in  some  sense  alive.  That  is, 
all  existence,  on  the  plane  where  it  shows  original 
activity,  acts,  or  is  capable  of  acting,  with  reference 
to  ends,  values,  satisfactions. 

Why  do  infinitesimal  individuals,16  that  is,  the 
elementary  units  of  matter,  such  as  atoms,  molecules, 
and  cells,  act  as  they  do?  One  may  adopt  the  hy- 
pothesis of  necessity,  and  say  that  they  have  been 
eternally  determined  so  that  they  have  to  function  in 
those  ways;  but  that  is  not  far  from  saying  that  no 
reason  can  be  given.  In  the  face  of  this  inquiry  the 
newer  view  resorts  to  analogy;  and,  since  molecules 
and  atoms  appear  to  be  individuals,  the  analogy  is 
naturally  taken  from  the  organic  realm,  where  in- 
dividuality is  a  familiar  phenomenon.  In  all  living 
things  established  functioning  is  a  sure  sign  of  some 
end  served  by  the  function ;  either  an  end  in  the  agent 

"  Cf.  p.  132  f,  supra. 


166    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

so  acting,  or  in  some  larger  system  of  which  it  is  a 
part, — often  in  both.  The  birth,  growth,  metabo- 
lism, and  movements  of  a  cell  all  have  reference  to 
maintaining  its  life  and  type,  with  the  resulting 
satisfactions,  together  with  the  life  and  type  and 
satisfactions  of  the  organism  of  which  it  is  an  in- 
tegral part.  This  is  so  true,  that  the  biologist  is  not 
content  until  he  discovers  the  ends  so  served.  Why 
may  not  a  kindred  explanation,  in  more  rudimentary 
form,  be  the  truest  account  of  the  functionings  of 
molecules,  and  other  physical  individuals,  also? 
Certainly  analogy  to  the  higher  types  of  individuals 
seems  a  sounder  method  of  interpreting  the  activities 
of  those  that  are  lower  than — as  was  the  method  of 
the  older  materialism — a  comparison  with  physical 
masses,  (stones,  waters,  winds,  and  so  forth)  which 
show  no  marks  of  individuality  at  all. 

Thus  the  view  of  the  old  materialism  stands  for  the 
unbroken  reign  of  necessity;  the  newer,  development, 
or  pluralistic,  view  stands  for  the  influence  of  values; 
the  former  for  action  determined  purely  from  behind, 
the  latter  for  action  determined  both  from  behind 
and  also  from  before — by  what  is  in  view.  This  lat- 
ter conception  involves  in  all  individuals,  physical  as 
well  as  organic,  at  least  a  rudimentary  consciousness 
— some  feeling  of  value — since  it  is  the  influence  of 
things  felt  to  be  in  some  way  valuable,  or  good,  that 
in  part  determines  action;  and  the  influence  of  the 
value  factor — the  end  in  view — is  regarded  as  in- 
creasing concomitantly  with  increased  organization. 

Both  Causes  and  Ends  are  Valid. — The  truth  seems 
to  be  that  both  antecedent  causes  and  final  causes 


LAW— VALUES  167 

are  proper  satisfactions  of  fundamental  human  inter- 
ests, sound  answers  to  legitimate  human  inquiries. 
The  one  class  answer  the  question,  how? — the  me- 
chanical question; the  other  class  answer  the  question, 
what  for? — the  question  of  value.  The  former  gratify 
the  analytic-synthetic  interest  of  the  mind — its  lik- 
ing for  taking  things  apart  and  putting  them  together 
again;  the  latter  its  esthetic  interest,  its  immediate 
concern  with  and  estimation  of  things.  The  former 
deal  with  existences  as  objects  with  parts  and  struc- 
ture, the  latter  with  existences  as  wholes,  and  their 
character  irrespective  of  the  underlying  articulation 
and  machinery. 

Descriptive  and  Appreciative  Knowledge. — These 
differences  in  reference  and  in  appeal  to  our  interest 
are  connected  with  a  broad  distinction  too  often 
overlooked  between  two  distinct  kinds  of  knowledge. 
Knowledge  may  be  either  "descriptive"  or  "appre- 
ciative," to  use  Professor  Royce's  terms;  it  may  be 
primarily  either  "explanation"  or  "estimation,"  in 
the  phraseology  of  Professor  Hoffding.  Descriptive, 
or  scientific,  knowledge  is  that  which  is  won  through 
the  discovery  of  the  causes  and  other  mechanical 
relations  of  things;  appreciative  knowledge  is  that 
gained  through  the  immediate  response  of  our  organ- 
isms to  stimuli  or  through  their  own  inner  functioning. 
It  roots  in  some  awareness  of  value;  hence  the  terms 
"appreciation"  and  "estimation."  Thus  acquaint- 
ance with  the  services  rendered  the  organism  by  vari- 
ous foods  and  the  mechanical  and  chemical  processes 
of  digestion,  might  constitute  a  scientific  knowledge 
of  what,  aside  from  the  social  element,  was  going  on 


168    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

at  a  banquet;  but  if  the  knower  of  these  things  was 
excluded  from  the  feast,  especially  if  he  had  always 
been  excluded  from  such  scenes,  his  knowledge  would 
be  very  one-sided,  and  with  all  its  extent  and  accur- 
acy very  thin  and  weak,  also.17  The  dullest  guest 
would  know  much  about  the  viands,  and  that  in  a 
relatively  vivid  way,  which  was  unknown  to  him. 
The  contrast  is  the  same  on  a  higher  plane  when  we 
compare  an  auditor  at  a  fine  symphony  who  has  a 
thorough  acquaintance  with  the  mechanism  of  sound, 
but  no  musical  ear,  with  another  at  the  same  per- 
formance endowed  with  keen  musical  appreciation, 
but  no  knowledge  of  acoustics.  As  Professor  D.  S. 
Miller  remarks:  "The  head  analyzes;  the  heart 
realizes." 

Now,  the  man  of  science  and  still  more  the  mechan- 
ical philosopher  are  tempted  to  regard  descriptive, 
or  scientific,  knowledge,  since  it  is  the  kind  which 
most  furthers  their  ends,  as  the  only  kind  of  knowl- 
edge worthy  of  the  name.  Two  facts,  however, 
should  give  them  pause:  (1)  The  fundamental  mate- 
rials of  science  root  in  appreciation.  Sensations  (col- 
ors, sounds,  flavors,  etc.)  as  such  are  not  descriptive 
but  appreciative  in  type.  (2)  At  all  stages  of  organic 
development,  from  the  lowest  to  the  highest,  appre- 
ciative knowledge  is  the  only  kind  which  moves  the 
will,  that  is,  arouses  action.  The  most  perfect  de- 
scription is  impotent  until  it  brings  before  the  mind 

17  Cf.  the  remark  of  Professor  James  ("Varieties  of  Religious 
Experience,"  p.  488),  quoted  from  Al-Ghayzali,  that  to  understand 
the  causes  of  drunkenness,  as  a  physician  understands  them,  is  not 
to  be  drunk. 


LAW— VALUES  169 

some  object  or  situation  which  appeals  in  a  direct, 
immediate  way  to  appreciation  (feeling).  The  sani- 
tary expert,  the  sociologist  in  reform  agitations,  and 
their  like,  have  learned  this  to  their  cost;  while  the 
orator  and  the  preacher,  and  especially  the  musician 
and  the  artist,  are  supposed  to  have  known  it 
always. 

Values  and  Mechanism. — If  causes  and  ends 
(values)  are  complementary  segments  of  the  area  of 
human  interest,  each  having  a  corresponding  type  of 
knowledge,  it  would  seem  that  there  should  be  no 
conflict  between  the  concepts  of  mechanism  and 
value.  The  contrary,  however,  is  often  assumed.  It 
has  been  taken  for  granted  that,  if  the  world  is  indeed 
a  mighty  mechanism,  or  a  vast  congeries  of  mechan- 
isms, it  cannot  exist  for  any  purpose  or  purposes. 
Yet  in  all  mechanisms  of  human  construction  the 
two  ideas  are  so  far  from  being  in  conflict  that  they 
are  all  but  inseparable.  A  man-made  machine  with- 
out a  purpose  would  be  regarded  as  an  absurd  freak 
of  industry.  Nor  is  the  situation  very  different  with 
natural  mechanisms.  The  machinery  of  digestion, 
that  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood,  and  that  of  sen- 
sation all  have  reference  to  ends  (and  values)  which 
they  serve.  The  like  is  true  of  the  mechanical 
adjustments  involved  in  ocean  currents  and  the 
movements  of  the  planets  in  the  solar  system. 
So  far  as  these  constitute  established  mechanisms, 
or  dynamic  systems,  they  serve  ends  of  material 
distribution  and  dynamic  equilibrium.  In  gen- 
eral it  may  be  said  that  any  object  is  recognized  as  a 
mechanism  by  the  very  fact  that  its  established  inner 


170    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

adjustments  and  interactions  make  for  some  end  or 
purpose.1* 

The  point  really  doubtful  in  this  connection  is 
whether  natural  mechanisms  are  like  human  ones  in 
serving  ends  that  were  intended  before  the  construc- 
tion began,  that  is,  the  presence  in  the  world  of  con- 
scious purpose,  or  design.  When  man  constructs  a 
locomotive,  he  knows  beforehand  just  what  end  his  en- 
gine is  to  serve,  and  designs  it  with  reference  thereto. 
Was  there  a  Maker  of  the  world  who  foresaw  with 
equal  clearness  the  ends  which  the  world  now  actu- 
ally serves,  and  intended  them?  This  is  indeed  a 
doubtful  matter,19  and  present  day  opinion  seems  to 

18  On  the  other  hand,  the  admission  of  value  seeking  as  a  prime 
dynamic  in  an  individual  does  not  prevent  description  of  its  processes 
in  thoroughly  mechanical  terms.    An  animal,  for  example,  may  be 
described  as  a  highly  complex  engine — that  is,  a  machine  that  de- 
velops its  own  power — adjusted  to  do  certain  things,  and  with  its 
controlling  parts  in  very  delicate  equilibrium.     As  a  consequence 
what  from  the  physical  point  of  view  is  a  very  small  interference 
suffices  to  set  the  engine  going  in  some  characteristic  way.    In  the 
case  of  man  that  interference,  commonly  called  the  stimulus,  is 
very  often  some  fault  or  partial  repetition  in  the  mechanisn  itself  of 
a  former  inner  movement,  or  function,  which  was  satisfactory, 
interesting,  or  pleasing.     When  such  a  faint  repetition  becomes 
attached  to  a  possible  course  of  action  on  the  part  of  the  organism, 
it  seems  to  be  the  slide  valve  which  releases  the  stored  energy  in 
channels  leading  to  that  course  of  action.     That  potent  little  re- 
peated inner  process,  of  which  some  movement  in  the  central  nervous 
system  is  doubtless  the  core,  the  psychologist  calls  a  memory  or  an 
idea,  as  the  case  may  be.     The  logician  calls  it  a  value,  for  it  is  some- 
thing that  appeals  to  the  organism  and  sways  it  because  it  is  good. 

19  Of.  p.  140,  supra.    This,  however,  is  not  necessarily  a  doubt  aa 
to  the  existence  or  agency  of  God,  but  only  as  to  one  theory  about 
his  agency,  the  traditional  one  of  eternal,  pre-existent  design.    As 
to  this  it  is  pertinent  to  inquire  whether  the  present  universe  is 
merely  the  last  of  a  seriea  of  like  universes  which  God  has  con- 


LAW— VALUES  171 

lean  to  the  negative  side.  The  adjustments,  inter- 
actions and  established  sequences  of  the  mechanisms 
of  nature  may  have  some  other  explanation  than  the 
antecedent  conscious  purpose  of  a  personal  being. 
Yet  a  negative  inference  is  not  to  be  justified  by  the 
mere  concept  of  mechanism  itself;  for  both  the  terms 
mechanism  and  the  ideas  involved  in  it  are,  as  has 
been  intimated  already,  drawn  from  human  agency — 
man's  ways  of  effecting  results — and  in  his  machines 
there  is  always  some  prevision  of  the  result  to  be  at- 
tained. Lack  of  any  such  prevision  in  a  mechanical 
engineer,  would  render  him  the  laughing  stock  of 
his  neighbors,  even  if  they  did  not  shut  him  up  in  an 
asylum  as  a  dangerous  character.  It  is  evident, 
therefore,  that  the  notion  of  design  as  underlying 
cosmic  mechanisms  is  a  perfectly  legitimate  one  in 
itself;  whether  it  is  a  trustworthy  one  or  not  seems  to 
be  purely  a  question  of  evidence. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Descartes,  with  all 
his  enthusiasm  for  the  mechanical,  was  far  from  really 
eliminating  intelligent  design  and  control.  He  re- 
garded the  organization  of  the  universe  as  coming 
about  mechanically  without  any  design  within  itself 
and  without  any  superintending  personal  guidance 
from  without.  On  the  other  hand,  an  intelligent  de- 
signer at  the  beginning  of  the  present  order  is  involved 
in  his  postulate  that  matter  worked  itself  into  its 

structed;  for,  if  it  is  his  first  and  only  attempt,  then  analogy  from 
human  construction  in  the  way  of  first  attempts  would  not  lead  us 
to  attribute  to  him  any  large  advance  knowledge  of  the  outcome. 
In  new  situations  man  has  to  feel  hie  way,  and  adjust  himself  to 
new  situations  as  he  meets  them.  The  like  may  well  be  the  case 
with  the  Creator  constructing  a  universe  for  the  first  time. 


172    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

present  form  under  the  control  of  laws  impressed 
upon  it  by  God.20  As  to  the  mechanism  of  the  human 
body  he  held  it  to  be  controlled  by  a  rational  soul 
seated  within  it  and  using  it  for  intelligent  purposes 
like  the  modern  engineer  in  a  locomotive. 

EXERCISES 

1.  Give  five  examples  of  natural  laws,  stating  them  with 
precision,  and  show  in  what  sense  they  are  constructions  rather 
than  discoveries.    What  two  kinds  of  things  expressed  in  them 
have  been  discovered? 

2.  Give  a  critical  account  of  the  standing  of  natural  laws  in 
science,  and  show  on  what  sub-principle  or  postulate  of  mech- 
anism they  are  based  and  to  what  primary  methodological 
principle  they  are  subject. 

3.  Mention  five  (original)  cases  of  animal-action  with  a  view 
to  results,  and  contrast  them  with  five  cases  of  the  action  of 
natural  agencies  that  seem  necessitated. 

4.  Describe  five  situations  or  processes  within  plant  or  animal 
organisms  in  regard  to  which  the  consideration  of  final  causes,  or 
ends  served,  is  requisite  for  a  satisfactory  explanation.    Show 
how  in  these  cases  mechanism  is  nevertheless  involved. 

5.  Show  what  Whetham  means  by  calling  our  knowledge  of 
nature  a  "model"  or  "chart."    (Cf  "Recent  Devels.  of  Phys. 
Science,"  chap.  I.) 

6.  Read  Darwin's  "Life,"  etc.,  chap.  II,  pp.  81-83,  and  point 
out  what  kind  of  knowledge  became  difficult  to  him  and  why, 
and  in  what  kind  he  gained  great  power.    Give  examples  of  each 
kind  drawn  from  his  career. 

»"  Method,"  Pt.  V.  Cf.  p.  95,  supra.  Cf.  also  the  following 
statement  of  Professor  Huxley:  "The  teleological  and  the  mechani- 
cal views  of  nature  are  not  necessarily  mutually  exclusive.  On  the 
contrary,  the  more  purely  a  mechanist  the  spectator  is,  the  more 
firmly  does  he  affirm  primordial  nebular  arrangement,  of  which  all  the 
phenomena  of  the  universe  are  consequences,  the  more  completely  is 
he  thereby  at  the  mercy  of  the  teleologist,  who  can  always  defy  him  to 
disprove  that  this  primordial  nebular  arrangement  was  not  intended 
to  evolve  the  phenomena  of  the  universe." — "Critiques,"  p.  274. 


CHAPTER  X 
EVOLUTION 

The  two  sciences  of  geology  and  biology  have 
worked  a  revolution  in  a  little  over  half  a  century 
in  our  thoughts  of  the  world  in  which  we  live.  From 
geology  we  have  learned  that  the  earth  was  not 
always  what  it  is  now,  nor  will  it  remain  in  its  present 
state.  It  has  a  history  (which  is  the  science  of 
geology)  and  it  is  now  making,  and  it  will  hi  future 
make,  further  material  for  its  history.  The  most 
notable  feature  of  that  history  is  the  broad  fact  that 
for  countless  ages  past  the  earth  changes  have  been 
on  the  whole  in  the  direction  of  increased  complexity 
and  higher *  organization.  Another  significant  feature 
of  the  earth  history  is  the  fact  that  living  things  are, 
comparatively  speaking,  recent  comers  upon  the 
earth,  and  that  their  first  appearances  here  have 
constituted  an  age-long  series  of  new  arrivals.  At 
intervals  through  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years 
new  organic  types  have  been  appearing.  This 
series  of  arrivals,  also,  takes  on  an  orderly  and  pro- 
gressive character  when  viewed  from  the  standpoint 

1  This  word  is  sometimes  challenged  as  inappropriate  in  natural 
descriptions.  Nature,  it  is  urged,  knows  no  difference  of  higher  and 
lower,  that  is,  of  value;  but  all  conditions  are  equally  good  and  high 
to  it.  However  this  may  be,  the  term  in  the  text  is  at  least  justifiable 
from  man's  point  of  view.  By  "higher  organization"  is  meant  the 
arrangement  of  things  which  yields  richer  values  to  sentient  beings. 
173 


174    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

of  organization;  for,  with  rare  exceptions,  the  later 
types  are  the  more  highly  organized,  and  the  earlier 
the  simpler.  The  long  earth  story  is  thus  one  of 
orderly  and  progressive  change,  of  persistent  pro- 
duction of  higher  types,  that  is,  of  development. 

Of  late  this  geological  story  has  been  taken  up  in  a 
remarkable  way  by  the  biological  sciences;  for  they 
favor  the  belief  that  the  new  forms  of  life  thus  appear- 
ing from  time  to  time  are  not  new  creations,  as  was 
once  thought,  but  are  really  modifications  of,  and  in  a 
sense  improvements  on,  earlier  organic  forms.  The 
formidable  octopus  is  the  descendant  through  long 
generations  of  a  minute  gelatinous  creature  con- 
stituted of  a  single  cell;  the  powerful  Percheron 
horse  of  to-day  is  the  direct,  though  greatly  modified, 
descendant  of  an  archaic  pigmy  quadruped  with  four 
or  five  toes  instead  of  one;  while  man  himself  must 
trace  his  lineage  back  to  a  tree-dwelling  animal 
not  unlike  one  of  the  larger  apes.  The  long  process  of 
modification  and  development  through  which  these 
newer  and  higher  types  have  been  produced  has 
received  the  name  of  evolution. 

The  student  is,  of  course,  aware  that  evolution  is 
to-day  a  word  of  power  and  promise.  It  is  already 
the  key  to  many  a  natural  arcanum,  and  seems 
likely  to  unlock  other  recesses  that  are  still  closed 
and  dark.  Perhaps  no  other  principle  has  proved 
so  serviceable,  unless  it  be  that  of  mechanism,  a 
concept  of  which  it  is  in  part  the  antithesis,  in  part 
the  complement.  Mechanism  emphasizes  the  de- 
terminateness  and  fixity  of  nature,  and  evolution 
its  plasticity  and  progressiveness;  mechanism  rep- 


EVOLUTION  175 

resents  the  world  as  it  is  at  any  given  moment, 
evolution  indicates  how  it  came  to  be  what  it  is. 
Yet  the  evolutionary  conception  has  met  with 
much  opposition, — at  first  in  scientific  circles,  and 
still  in  those  of  theology.  It  has  been  declared  in- 
credible that  life  should  thus  climb  from  low  and 
simple  beginnings,  and  shape  itself  at  length  into 
the  amazingly  complex  forms  of  the  higher  organisms. 
How  far  removed  is  Napoleon  from  a  jelly-fish! 
And  truly  the  marvel  which  the  theory  requires  us 
to  accept  is  neither  to  be  denied  nor  disparaged.  Yet 
it  is  far  from  incredible,  for  the  reason  that  it  is 
supported  by  the  analogy  of  another  and  incontestable 
wonder  which  is  even  greater,  the  familiar  wonder  of 
the  growth  of  animals  and  plants  from  an  egg  or 
seed.  How  is  it  that  the  fertilized  egg  of  a  bird  or 
fowl,  kept  certain  weeks  at  a  definite  temperature 
and  turned  daily,  will  of  itself  develop  into  an  elabor- 
ately organized  being  like  its  parents?  This,  ever 
since  man  became  a  reflective  being  has  been  a 
baffling  problem,  a  perpetual  miracle.  Only  of  late 
has  any  answer  worthy  to  be  called  scientific  been 
returned,  and  still  the  answer  is  all  too  imperfect. 
The  biologist  has  discovered  that  in  each  such  case  an 
established,  orderly  process  of  gradual  and  progres- 
sive change  is  involved.  It  starts  with  a  tiny  organic 
individual  called  a  cell,  which  under  proper  condi- 
tions of  heat  and  moisture  awakes  to  active  life, 
soon  dividing  itself  into  two  "daughter  cells,"  each 
of  which  is  as  much  alive  and  capable  of  reproduction 
as  was  the  vanished  mother.  This  process  of  bifurca- 
tion, or  "fission,"  is  repeated  again  and  again, 


176    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

until  the  number  of  living  cells  is  sufficiently  great, 
whereupon  they  arrange  themselves  hi  a  kind  of 
web  of  two  or  three  layers.  The  next  stage  is  one 
of  the  enfolding  of  the  layer  on  one  side  of  the  web 
by  that  on  the  other,  so  that  a  sac  is  formed  with  an 
open  mouth  opposite  the  central  portion  of  the  en- 
folded layer.  The  process  of  cell  multiplication 
continues,  but  combined  with  it  now  are  speciali- 
zations of  function.  The  daughter  cells  are  no  longer, 
even  to  the  eye  of  the  observer,  mere  duplications 
of  the  mother,  but  differ  in  appearance  and  function 
more  and  more.  The  series  of  changes  is  much  too 
long  and  intricate  to  be  followed  in  these  pages  in 
detail,  but  that  they  are  true  mechanical  links  in 
a  chain  of  purposive,  or  teleogical,  processes  may  be 
illustrated  by  the  simple  statement  that  the  changes 
which  occur  within  the  sac,  or  gastrula,  all  work 
toward  the  production  of  the  viscera  of  the  developing 
animal,  while  those  occurring  in  the  outer  (and 
middle)  layers  of  cells  go  to  produce  its  bones  and 
muscular  parts. 

Now  these  changes  seem  to  take  place  of  themselves 
when  certain  relatively  simple  conditions — as  of 
heat,  moisture  and  support — are  supplied.  Of  course 
this  seeming  may  be  deceptive,  and  there  may  be 
an  invisible  and  enduring  agent  of  intelligent  con- 
trol present.  The  biologist's  knowledge  does  not 
enable  him  to  declare  confidently  as  to  this  possibil- 
ity;2 but  at  least  the  accredited  facts  as  to  individual 

*The  complete  absence  of  any  such  enduring  agent  leaves  the 
orderly  constructiveness  of  the  individual  genetic  process  a  baffling 
problem;  for  during  that  expanding  creative  process  all  the  con- 


EVOLUTION  177 

genesis  and  growth  furnish  ample  analogical  war- 
rant for  accepting  at  least  a  seeming  self-development 
in  the  case  of  the  genesis  of  new  species.  If  the 
phylogeny,  that  is,  the  evolution  of  a  species  from 
a  simpler  form  of  life,  is  wonderful,  as  it  assuredly 
is,  it  is  but  a  similar  and  less  extreme  wonder  to  that 
of  the  ontogeny — the  origin  within  a  few  weeks  or 
months  of  individuals  of  those  higher  orders  from  the 
seemingly  simple  substance  of  the  fertilized  egg. 

The  first  to  make  important  contributions  to  the 
phylogenetic  problem — that  of  the  origin  of  species — 
were  the  biologists,  Lamarck 3  and  Treviranus,4 
who  lived  in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century. 
Lamarck  maintained  that  specific  types  were  simply 
the  natural  modifications  in  the  course  of  descent 
of  a  common  generic  ancestral  form.  The  resem- 
blances between  the  members  of  a  species  he  ac- 
counted for  by  the  principle  of  heredity;  that  is,  in 
these  respects  the  ancestral  type  had  been  bequeathed 
unchanged.  The  differences  between  the  species 
of  a  common  genus  he  explained  by  pointing  to  the 
influence  of  use  and  disuse  upon  the  structure  of 
the  organs  of  animals  and  plants.  His  first  contention 
— common  descent  as  the  secret  of  specific  likenesses 
— may  be  said  to  be  established.  It  is  a  familiar 

etituent  cells  are  born  and  die  again  in  all  but  countless  generations. 
As  Professor  Wilson  remarks  ("The  Cell,"  p.  328),  "Any  theory 
we  can  frame  demands  for  the  orderly  distribution  of  the  elements 
of  the  germ-plasm  a  prearranged  system  of  forces  of  absolutely 
inconceivable  complexity." 

*  Lamarck  (1744-1829),  a  celebrated  French  naturalist,  waa 
professor  of  natural  history  at  the  Jardin  des  Plantes  in  Paris. 

4  Treviranus  (1776-1837)  was  a  German  naturalist  of  distinction. 


178    RESULTS-EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

fact  that  constitutional  characteristics  are  heredi- 
tary;5 the  children,  whether  of  men  or  animals, 
are  apt  to  resemble  their  parents,  and  so  to  resemble 
each  other,  also.  Though  this  is  not  an  invariable 
rule  owing  to  the  extreme  complexity  of  family 
stocks,  yet  commonly  we  do  discover  a  family  like- 
ness in  the  offspring  of  the  same  pair.  Turning  this 
principle  around  and  reading  the  unknown  past  by 
means  of  it,  Lamarck  argued  reasonably  enough  that 
extensive  similarities  in  organisms  are  evidence  of 
their  descent  from  the  same  original  ancestors.  So 
far  present-day  biologists  agree  with  him. 

His  second  principle,  that  of  the  structural  modi- 
fication of  organs  through  use,  is  more  doubtful.  It 
is  indeed  true  that  use  and  disuse  affect  the  develop- 
ment and  type  of  organic  parts.  The  working  ox 
has  hard  tissues  which  make  poor  beef  just  because 
it  works.  If  it  had  been  kept  in  meadow  and  stall 
until  slaughtered,  its  flesh  would  have  made  far 
better  food.  A  dog  is  naturally  a  swift-footed 
animal,  but  the  pampered  lap-dog  often  becomes 
incapable  of  running  any  considerable  distance. 
The  eye  of  the  hawk  and  the  eagle  is  sharpened 
by  vigilant  use,  as  are  also  the  wits  of  a  man.  La- 
marck argued  that  the  individual  differences  in  living 
things  which  arise  in  such  ways,  being  handed  down 

*  Heredity  may  be  regarded  as  a  quasi-extension  of  the  principle 
of  habit  from  the  single  individual  to  the  race  lineally  viewed.  Just 
as  the  individual  finds  it  easier  to  do  what  it  has  done  before,  and, 
under  similar  circumstances,  tends  to  do  that  thing  rather  than 
another,  so  the  reproductive  processes  to  which  the  succeeding 
generations  are  due  tend  to  repeat  the  type  of  one  or  both  of  the 
parents. 


EVOLUTION  179 

to  the  offspring  by  heredity,  would  often  be  increased 
in  degree  and  fixed  in  the  family  stock  by  the  rep- 
etitions of  use  or  disuse  which  natural  conditions 
might  bring  about.  Thus  the  ancestors  of  the 
giraffe  might  not  have  excelled  a  horse  or  a  zebra 
in  length  of  neck;  but  if  they  inhabited  a  district 
where  grass  was  lacking  most  of  the  year  and  food 
was  to  be  obtained  only  by  browsing  from  the  trees, 
then  the  continual  reaching  up  to  the  branches  on 
the  part  of  generation  after  generation  of  these 
animals  might  quite  possibly  result  in  a  permanent 
elongation  of  the  neck  such  as  we  now  see  in  the 
giraffe. 

This  theory  had  a  very  plausible  sound,  but  a 
serious  and  probably  fatal  difficulty  transpired  in  the 
course  of  tune ;  for  acquired  characteristics  (modified 
organs,  etc.)  are  either  not  hereditary,  or  hereditary 
in  such  a  minor  degree  as  to  furnish  no  adequate 
explanation  of  the  origin  of  new  forms  of  life.  A 
man  who  is  by  nature  of  athletic  build  may  transmit 
that  physical  characteristic  to  his  children,  and  is 
very  apt  to  do  so  if  his  wife  is  also  naturally  of  a 
superior  physical  type;  but  if  constitutionally  the 
pair  have  merely  ordinary  physiques  and  develop 
athletic  proficiency  through  training,  there  appears 
to  be  no  constitutional  tendency  in  their  chilciren  to 
excel  in  that  respect.  Nature  is  very  chary,  if  not 
utterly  refractory,  about  adopting  acquired  char- 
acteristics for  addition  to  the  hereditary  family 
stock. 

Natural  Selection. — Evolution  in  our  time  is 
associated,  not  with  Lamarck,  but  with  the  great 


180    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

name  of  Charles  Darwin,  whose  doctrine  of  natural 
selection,  worked  out  with  utmost  care  and  fine  intel- 
ligence, outlined  a  probable  natural  mechanism  by 
which  the  origin  of  species  could  be  accounted  for  on 
evolutionary  lines.  Artificial  selection  was,  of  course, 
a  familiar  process  in  Darwin's  day,  as  it  is  still.  It 
consists  in  the  repeated  choice  generation  after 
generation,  on  the  part  of  a  breeder  of  plants  or 
animals,  of  those  specimens  for  reproductive  purposes 
which  possess  in  largest  measure  some  desired 
characteristic.  A  breeder  who  wishes  to  develop  a 
stronger  draught  horse  will  select  for  breeding  pur- 
poses only  those  stallions  and  mares  which  have  the 
heaviest  bones  and  the  stoutest  muscles  and  sinews. 
He  will  see  to  it  that  these  specimens  leave  issue 
while  the  inferior  horses  do  not;  and  so  on  for  several 
generations  of  horses.  Now,  Darwin's  great  thought 
was  that,  in  a  blinder  and  consequently  slower  way, 
ordinary  physical  factors  in  the  environment  of  living 
forms,  such  as  the  limitation  of  food  supply  and  the 
severities  and  changes  of  climate,  have  always  been 
acting  upon  them  as  selecting  agencies,  killing  off  the 
weaker  and  otherwise  unfit  individuals,  and  leaving 
only  the  more  vigorous  (or  otherwise  especially 
adapted)  to  transmit  their  types  to  posterity.  Na- 
ture, on  this  view,  has  unconsciously  acted  like  a  wise 
but  unsparing  gardener,  who  causes  his  beds  to  show 
only  vigorous  plants  by  pulling  up  the  weaker  ones. 

In  this  notable  theory  Darwin  relied  upon  three 
principles. 

(1)  Struggle  for  Existence.  In  general  organisms 
multiply  faster  than  their  means  of  subsistence. 


EVOLUTION  181 

When  the  food  supply  falls  short  of  what  is  needed 
for  the  proper  support  of  all  the  individuals  of  a 
species,  a  competitive  struggle  between  them  for 
the  possession  of  food  takes  place,  a  struggle  which 
may  be  a  literal  combat  or,  as  in  the  case  of  plants, 
merely  a  more  successful  appropriation  of  the  food. 
In  either  case,  many  of  the  less  fit  perish,  and  leave 
no  descendants.  Furthermore,  all  living  things  hold 
to  life  by  a  tenure  more  or  less  frail.  Besides  the 
familiar  adversities  of  climate,  every  living  type  has 
its  living  foes,  either  in  the  form  of  other  organisms 
which  use  it  for  food  or  of  parasites  who  seek  it  as 
places  of  abode.  Continued  existence  is  the  prize  of 
success  in  the  warfare  with  environment,  living  and 
physical,  a  warfare  which  is  far  more  general  and  se- 
vere than  ordinary  casual  observation  would  indicate. 
It  is  the  strongest,  the  swiftest,  the  best  adapted  to 
heat  or  cold,  or  the  best  qualified  in  other  ways,  who 
hold  on  to  life. 

Every  experienced  lumberman  has  observed  a 
striking  result  of  this  struggle.  He  may  have  little 
enough  idea  of  the  organic  conflict  going  on  under  his 
eyes,  but  he  is  familiar  with  the  fact  that  when  he 
cuts  off  a  tract  of  virgin  forest — in  the  north  generally 
made  up  of  evergreens — the  volunteer  growth  that 
springs  up  among  the  stumps  is  different  in  type  from 
that  which  fell  before  his  ax.  Hardwoods  commonly 
follow  an  evergreen  growth,  though  at  times  one 
kind  of  evergreen  succeeds  another.  Cedars  may 
follow  hemlocks,  for  example.  The  secret  of  this 
change  appears  to  be  that  the  natural  conditions, 
both  of  climate  and  soil,  have  changed  since  the 


182    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

virgin  forest  arose,  and  another  form  of  growth  is 
now  better  fitted  to  reach  light  and  water  and  to 
resist  heat  and  drought,  than  the  great  conifers 
which  once  held  all  but  absolute  sway. 

(2)  Variation.  But  why  do  some  individuals  prove 
better  able  than  others  to  secure  food,  withstand 
hardship,  or  maintain  themselves  in  combat?    Some- 
times, of  course,  the  difference  is  due  to  superior 
accidental  advantages  at  the  outset.     Very  often, 
however,  it  is  due  to  constitutional  differences  which 
cannot  be  accounted  for,  differences  which  the  biolo- 
gist calls  variations  of  type.    Though  the  individuals 
of  a  species  of  course  resemble  each  other  in  the  main, 
yet  always  there  are  differences.     These  in  many 
cases  are  of  no  practical  moment;  but  sometimes, 
even  when  slight,  they  are  of  great  importance,  for 
through  them  the  possessor  is  enabled  to  survive 
amidst  adverse  conditions.    The  tendency — an  invet- 
erate one — of  organisms  to  differ  slightly  from  their 
fellows,  that  is,  to  vary  in  type,  is  what  is  meant  by 
the  principle  of  variation.    It  is  evidently  a  necessary 
factor  in  natural  selection;  for,  if  natural  processes 
are  to  select  some  individuals  because  of  their  special 
fitness   to   survive,    those   specially  fit   individuals 
must  first  exist;  that  is,  must  first  be  produced  in  the 
course  of  ordinary  generation. 

(3)  It  is  evident,  however,  that  natural  selection 
would  not  create  a  type  if  the  superior  characteris- 
tics of  survivors  were  not  transmitted  to  their  off- 
spring, that  is,  if  struggle  for  existence  and  variation 
were  not  supplemented  by  the  action  of  heredity — 
the  first  of  Lamarck's  two  explanatory  principles. 


EVOLUTION  183 

But  with  this  principle  bearing  sway  in  the  field  of 
life,  we  have  only  to  suppose  that  in  a  natural  situa- 
tion which  tests  radically  the  fitness  of  some  species 
to  survive,  the  unfit  are  completely  eliminated  by 
death,  to  make  it  evident  that  the  superior  individ- 
uals who  survive  will  most  likely  bequeath  their 
favorable  characteristics  as  a  permanent  vital  heri- 
tage to  the  generations  that  follow.  In  the  original 
successful  competitors  those  characteristics  were 
new  qualities,  novel  functions  or  relatively  so;  in  the 
descendants,  through  many  repetitions,  they  become 
fixed  features,  integral  parts  of  the  type.  So  heredity 
completes  the  work  of  variation  and  struggle  for 
existence. 

Now,  these  principles  are  known  to  be  actual 
working  factors  in  the  natural  world;  and  it  is  clear, 
consequently,  that  under  then*  sway,  through  the 
accumulation  of  characteristics  hi  this  way,  there  may 
well  have  been  in  the  long  ages  since  life  appeared  on 
the  earth,  a  fairly  continuous  progress  of  organic 
forms  from  the  lowest  beginnings  in  the  direction 
of  increased  adaptation  to  natural  conditions,  an 
adaptation  involving  either  new  adjustments  or 
larger  efficiency  or  both.  Such  a  progress  would 
naturally  be  toward  wider  differences  in  type  and 
greater  complexity  of  organization;  for  under  diverse 
physical  conditions — climate,  altitude,  etc. — quite 
different  variations  in  the  same  original  stock  will 
prove  serviceable  for  survival,  and  will  be  "selected" 
and  incorporated  in  the  type. 

Natural  Selection  not  Ideal  Evolution. — It  is  not 
easy  to  exaggerate  the  service  which  this  theory  has 


184    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

rendered  to  the  biological  sciences.  It  has  brought 
light  and  clearness  into  fields  that  before  were 
obscure,  continuity  and  order  where  before  was  a 
meaningless  medley.  It  has  furnished  helpful  inter- 
pretative analogies  to  other  departments  of  inquiry, 
also,  and  is  likely  to  continue  to  do  so. 

As  an  evolutionary  scheme  it  evidently  lies  between 
the  extremes  of  absolutism  and  the  old  materialism. 
There  is  in  it  no  suggestion  of  the  unbroken  sway  of 
"necessity"  and  the  mechanics  of  pure  impact. 
These  may  be  real  enough  in  certain  of  its  physical 
conditions,  such  as  cold  and  drought;  but  the  organic 
agents,  those  which  "struggle,"  survive,  and  leave 
offspring,  are  moved  by  a  sense  of  value,  a  craving 
for  the  satisfactions  of  life — food,  security,  ease,  and 
so  forth — and  the  forces  which  respond  to  these 
values  are  within  the  agents,  not  behind  them.  Inert 
objects  do  not  struggle. 

On  the  other  hand,  a  development  by  such  a  proc- 
ess does  not  bear  the  aspect  of  design.  It  is  hard  to 
believe  that  a  Being  who  had  clearly  in  view  in  ad- 
vance the  purpose  of  producing  the  species  that  now 
exist  would,  at  least  if  He  was  in  full  control,  have 
chosen  this  relatively  haphazard  method  of  realizing 
it,  a  method  so  wasteful  of  life  and  seemingly  so 
indifferent  to  inflicted  pain.  The  story  of  natural 
selection  is  a  tragic  epic,  according  to  which  existence 
has  groped  its  way,  at  the  cost  of  untold  toil  and 
suffering,  upward  to  higher  grades  of  being;  it  has 
not  unfolded  in  a  well-considered  way  according 
either  to  a  foreordained  plan  or  the  necessary  un- 
folding of  any  symmetrical  system  of  forces. 


EVOLUTION  185 

Cosmic  Evolutionism. — The  success  which  has 
attended  the  theory  of  natural  selection  in  the  organic 
field  has  led  many  in  our  day  to  the  belief  that  the 
key  which  is  to  unlock  the  secret  of  the  universe  as 
a  whole  must  be  some  sort  of  evolutionary  one.  The 
world — earth  and  planets,  sun  and  stars — evidently 
was  not  always  what  it  is  now;  may  it  not  be  that, 
instead  of  being  the  detailed  product  of  an  outside 
Creator,  or  possibly  the  outcome  of  fortuitous  and 
meaningless  forces,  it  is  continually  unfolding  from 
a  potential  initial  condition? 

The  thought  is  far  from  new.  Heraclitus 8  and  the 
Stoics,7  Democritus  and  others,  taught  doctrines 
more  or  less  akin  to  it.  Yet  it  did  not  find  hearty 
acceptance  among  ancient  thinkers,  they  being  too 
strongly  impressed  by  the  seemingly  changeless  as- 
pects of  existence.  How  firm  and  constant  was  the 
earth  under  foot !  how  immutable  the  mountains  and 
the  sky  (the  firmament)!  And  even  the  changeful 
things,  seas  and  clouds,  plants  and  animals,  were 
constant  in  their  perpetually  recurring  types,  indicat- 
ing that  beneath  or  behind  the  mutable  objects  of 
sense  there  was  changeless  existence.8  With  the  later 
thinkers  of  antiquity  the  doctrine  of  emanation  be- 

•  Heraclitus  (abt.  535-abt.  475  B.  C.)  was  a  remarkable  Greek 
philosopher  of  Ephesus  in  Asia  Minor.  He  championed  the  idea  that 
process  is  the  fundamental  reality  in  the  world,  and  that  nothing  is 
fixed  except  the  type  of  the  process.  He  anticipated  the  modern 
evolutionary  conception  of  descent  with  modifications. 

7  The  Stoics,  a  Greek  philosophical  school  founded  by  Zeno  about 
308  B.  C.,  looked  to  Heraclitus  as  their  great  authority  as  to  nature. 
To  his  metaphysics  they  joined  a  broadened  type  of  austere  cynic 
ethics. 

8  This  was  Plato's  most  distinctive  conception. 


186    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

came  the  favorite  view,  the  theory  that  complete 
and  perfect  existence  is  at  the  beginning  of  the  change 
process,  not  the  end.  That  ideal  existence  is  the 
first  cause,  or  source,  of  all  forms  of  phenomena,  and 
every  step  in  the  change  process  away  from  that 
eternal  source  is  a  step  down  in  the  grade  of  being,  a 
declension  not  a  development.9  Of  course,  ancient 
observers  were  familiar  with  seeds  and  eggs  and  their 
growth;  but  they  commonly  thought  of  these  things 
as  incidents  within  the  fixed  framework  of  the  world, 
epicycles  upon  a  larger  eternal  round  of  natural  proc- 
ess, a  relation  like  that  of  the  waxing  and  waning 
day  (morning,  noon,  and  night)  and  the  waxing  and 
waning  year  to  the  unchanging  movement  (as  it 
seemed  then)  of  the  heavens  about  the  earth. 

Even  hi  later  evolutionary  theories  the  disposition 
has  always  been  strong  to  hold  to  an  unchanging 
framework,  though  when  it  came  to  be  known  that 
changes  occur  in  the  very  rocks  and  mountains,  and 
that  neither  earth  nor  sun  is  fixed,  it  became  neces- 
sary to  think  of  that  framework  as  immaterial,  that 
is,  as  either  a  changeless  (Platonic)  type  or  an  eter- 
nal law  of  some  kind.10  Spinoza,  following  the  Neo- 
Platonists  of  the  third  century,  taught  that  all  things 
are  unfoldings  of  one  highly  potential  substance, 
which  perpetually  produces  every  sort  of  thing  that 
is  possible.  The  substance  is  rigidly  bound,  however, 
by  its  determinations,  or  character,  or  law,  nothing 
whatever  being  metaphysically  free;  and  so  at  any 
given  tune  only  those  new  things  are  possible  which 

9  Cf .  the  cosmology  of  the  Neo-Platonists. 

10  Cf .  p.  160  f,  supra,  for  the  discussion  of  these  concepts. 


EVOLUTION  187 

either  are  not  in  conflict  with  the  things  already  in 
existence  or  are  able  to  win  out  in  such  a  conflict. 
By  means  of  these  assumptions,  Spinoza  gives  us 
a  striking  picture  of  the  continual  evolution  from 
potential  substance  to  actual  existences  which,  as 
he  holds,  goes  on  unceasingly,  without  beginning  and 
without  end,  within  the  limits  of  immutable  natural 
law.  No  source  of  the  law  is  named,  or  admitted  as 
possible;  it  is  the  eternal,  rigid  case  within  which 
the  watch  of  the  evolutionary  process  forever  ticks.11 
Others  have  represented  the  evolutionary  process 
as  due  to  the  will  of  the  Deity  who  is  working  out  his 
unchanging  design  as  the  ages  pass, — 

"One  God,  one  law,  one  element, 
And  one  far-off  divine  event, 
To  which  the  whole  creation  moves." 

In  this  conception  the  evolutionary  element  bulks 
larger  than  in  that  of  Spinoza,  the  changeless  factor 
being  now  located  above  and  beyond  the  world,  which 
itself  is  perpetually  in  the  act  of  passing  on  from  stage 
to  stage  of  existence,  each  higher  than  the  last.  In 
all  such  doctrines,  whether  theistic  or  pantheistic, 
the  element  of  immanent  control,  that  is,  of  complete 
internal  guidance  in  accordance  with  some  idea  or 
purpose,  is  the  salient  thing.  In  this  respect  they 
are  all  to  be  contrasted  with  natural  selection,  in 

11  The  evolutionism  of  Leibniz,  though  more  ideal  is  similar  in 
this  respect.  On  the  other  hand,  some  present-day  evolutionists 
think  that  the  "laws"  (determinations)  are  products  of  the  evolu- 
tionary process — a  complete  reversal  of  the  ancient  conception, 
the  seemingly  permanent  aspects  of  the  world  thus  being  reduced 
to  the  position  of  incidents  of  the  change  process. 


188    RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

which  the  intelligent  or  ideal  factor  is  represented  as 
very  limited  in  its  scope,  and  as  groping  its  way  along 
a  course  determined  for  it  largely  by  what  seem  to 
be  accidental  circumstances. 

Spencer's  Evolutionism. — Herbert  Spencer  was 
the  first  thinker  to  develop  systematically  the  notion 
of  cosmic  evolution  in  a  quasi-scientific  way;  that  is, 
to  outline  a  mechanical  process  of  world  development 
in  close  accord  with  the  accredited  facts  and  laws  of 
modern  physical  science.  He  assumes  an  ultimate 
dynamic  existence  which  is  infinite  in  extent  and  there- 
fore incapable  of  organization  into  a  systematic 
whole,  that  is,  of  complete  dynamic  equilibrium; 
and  offers  as  his  thesis  the  proposition  that  develop- 
ment is  the  method  by  which  in  every  field  this  ulti- 
mate existence  works  itself  out  into  manifestation 
in  our  world.  His  field  of  inquiry  thus  becomes  the 
processes  by  which  this  fundamental  existence,  which 
of  course  is  imperceptible  to  us,  passes  into  the  inte- 
grated and  complex  types  which  we  know  as  the 
objects  of  sense.  His  theory,  to  use  his  own  words, 
concerns  the  "passage  of  the  imperceptible  into  the 
perceptible,"  a  passage  which  he  finds  to  be  charac- 
terized by  "loss  oj  motion  and  consequent  inte- 
gration." By  loss  of  motion  he  does  not  mean  an 
absolute  loss,  for  all  existence  is  characterized  by 
motion,  but  the  elimination,  in  greater  or  less  degree, 
from  certain  situations  or  areas  of  existence  of  such 
movements  as  tend  to  keep  particles  of  matter 
apart.  These  are  either  transformed  or  pass  on  to 
other  objects.  As  a  consequence  only  that  which 
causes  or  permits  close  association  of  the  particle/ 


EVOLUTION  189 

remains;  and  existence  is  left  in  a  more  coherent 
state.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  now  less  homogeneous. 
Motion  does  not  depart  or  suffer  transformation  at 
the  same  rate  in  all  the  parts  of  a  coherent  mass,  and 
the  differences  in  this  respect  become  intensified  as 
effects  are  accumulated.  What  process,  for  example, 
is  seemingly  more  simple  and  uniform  than  that  of 
the  cooling  of  a  glowing  body;  yet  in  the  case  of  the 
cooling  earth,  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  later  contrac- 
tions of  the  crust  had  to  deal  with  earlier,  albeit 
comparatively  minor,  differences  of  thickness  and 
strength,  they  have  produced  for  us  a  remarkable 
variety  of  mountain  ranges  and  ocean  depths. 

There  are  thus  in  the  Spencerian  theory  two  sub- 
principles  involved  in  the  passage  of  the  impercep- 
tible into  the  perceptible,  with  the  resulting  inte- 
gration. One  of  these  is  the  principle  of  the  "in- 
stability of  the  homogeneous,"  the  other  that  of 
the  "multiplication  of  effects."  Both  are  involved 
in  the  illustration  of  the  cooling  earth,  the  meaning 
of  "multiplication  of  effects"  having  been  indicated 
above.  As  to  the  first  principle  named,  if  we  suppose 
the  earth  to  have  been  once  a  perfectly  homogeneous 
liquid  (molten)  or  gaseous  sphere,  it  is  evident  that 
under  the  inevitable  conditions  of  an  infinite,  and 
so  not  equilibrated,  universe,  it  could  not  remain 
homogeneous.  It  would  not  cool  uniformly  through 
radiation,  partly  because  it  is  constantly  receiving 
new  heat  from  the  sun,  and  in  differing  measure  on 
its  various  parts  according  to  the  varying  angles  of 
incidence  presented  by  its  curved  surface;  partly  be- 
cause its  orbit  is  not  a  circle,  and  it  consequently 


190     RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 

varies  in  its  distance  from  the  sun;  partly,  again, 
because  its  axis  is  not  perpendicular  to  the  ecliptic, 
and  so  the  northern  and  southern  hemispheres  pre- 
sent different  angles  to  the  sun's  rays;  and  partly, 
finally,  because,  being  a  rotating  body,  it  is  neces- 
sarily of  shorter  diameter  through  the  poles  than 
through  the  equator,  and  so  will  lose  heat  faster  in  its 
polar  regions.  So,  Mr.  Spencer  argues,  in  an  infinite 
universe  a  homogeneous  body  cannot  remain  such; 
or,  at  least,  it  is  subject  to  many  influences  to  make 
it  heterogeneous.  By  means  of  these  two  principles 
he  succeeds  in  accounting  mechanically  for  certainly 
a  very  large  part  of  the  vast  diversity  of  the  uni- 
verse. 

We  have,  then,  from  Mr.  Spencer  an  account  of 
how  a  supposed  homogeneous,  dynamic  existence 
would  inevitably,  according  to  known  mechanical 
principles,  become  coherent  in  mass,  varied  in  type, 
and  fixed  in  character.  It  is  an  interesting  account, 
and  no  doubt  an  evolutionary  one,  so  far  as  it  goes. 
Nevertheless,  it  leaves  much  to  be  desired.  It  is  very 
general,  for  one  thing,  presenting  only  certain  major 
phases  of  the  cosmic  process.  A  more  serious  draw- 
back, however,  is  the  limitations — apparently  arbi- 
trary— which  it  puts  upon  the  field  of  inquiry. 
Spencer  offers  no  suggestion  as  to  why  things  act  at 
all;  why,  for  example,  all  organisms  strive  for  con- 
tinued existence.  All  such  inquiries  he  regards  as 
unanswerable — essentially  religious.  They  are  at- 
tempts to  penetrate  the  unknowable,  to  lift  the  veil 
of  Isis,  and  must  be  scientifically  fruitless.  On  the 
contrary,  he  holds  that  we  must  make  twofundamen- 


EVOLUTION  191 

tal  assumptions:  (1)  That  there  is  an  absolute,  infinite, 
unknowable  existence  which  is  the  source  and  back- 
ground of  all  phenomena;  and  (2)  that  there  is,  also,  an 
absolute,  underived  law,  or  principle,  namely,  the  per- 
sistence of  force,  the  persistence  being  entirely  blind 
and  completely  determinate. 

For  assumptions  these  appear  to  be  large  philosoph- 
ical statements.  The  second  is  evidently  the  old 
doctrine  of  physical  necessity  12  in  modem  guise;  and 
we  have  seen  already  that  the  hypothesis  of  force  as 
"necessary"  is  not  a  coercive  one,  and  is  only  to  be 
accepted  in  case  it  gives  the  best  explanation  of  the 
world.  The  first  assumption  reminds  us  at  once 
of  the  Neo-Platonic  theory  of  an  eternal,  infinite, 
unknowable  Fountain  of  all  existence.  It  seems  to  be 
Spinoza's  theory  in  nineteenth  century  language.  It 
has  repeatedly  been  remarked  that  though  Spencer 
holds  that  ultimate  existence  is  unknowable  to  men, 
yet  the  philosopher  himself  somehow  knows  that 
it  is  infinite,  dynamic,  determinate,  and  probably 
most  like  what  wells  up  in  us  hi  consciousness!  A 
more  fundamental  objection  is  that  the  very  notion 
is  self-contradictory,  for  a  thing  can  be  known  to 
exist  only  by  in  some  measure  knowing  it.1* 

11  Cf.  p.  156,  supra. 

11  Nor  can  any  present  facts  or  principles  be  known  as  necessary 
limits  to  knowledge;  for  to  know  any  object,  line,  or  point,  as  a 
limit  requires  a  knowledge  of  something  lying  beyond  it.  Thifl  in 
the  case  of  a  limit  to  knowledge  would  be  self-contradictory.  There 
are  doubtless  impassable  limits  to  our  knowledge,  but  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  we  are  unaware  of  what  and  where  they  are.  Cf.  the 
remark  of  Hegel:  "No  one  is  aware  that  anything  is  a  limit  or  defect 
until  at  the  same  time  he  is  above  and  beyond  it." 


192     RESULTS— EMPIRICAL  PRINCIPLES 


EXERCISES 

1.  Describe  three  (original)  cases  in  which  Lamarck's  theory 
might  seem  to  account  for  striking  plant  or  animal  types. 

2.  Give  five  cases  (15  in  all)  illustrating  each  of  the  sub- 
principles  involved  in  natural  selection,  and  showing  that  these 
principles  are  valid  quite  apart  from  Darwin's  noted  theory. 

3.  Describe  five  cases  of  evident  adaptation  to  environment, 
and  show  how  Darwin's  theory  will  account  for  them. 

4.  Describe  two  (original)  cases  of  what  Spencer  calls  the 
"instability  of  the  homogeneous."    Examples  might  be  taken 
from  meteorology  and  mechanics. 

5.  Do  the  same  with  the  principle  of  the  "multiplication  of 
effects." 

6.  After  referring  to  a  good  history  of  philosophy,  or  other 
work  on  the  subject,  outline  Spinoza's  theory  of  the  world 
process,  and  show  how  far  the  evolutionary  idea  enters  into  his 
system. 

7.  Expand  into  prose  detail  and  something  like  system  the 
evolutionary  idea  suggested  in  the  last  six  stanzas  of  Tennyson's 
"In  Memoriam." 


PART  III 
BASAL  PRINCIPLES 


CHAPTER  XI 
POSTULATES 

Descartes  tells  us  that  he  concluded  he  "ought  to 
reject  as  absolutely  false  all  opinions  in  regard  to  which 
[he]  could  suppose  the  least  ground  for  doubt,  in 
order  to  ascertain  whether  after  that  there  remained 
aught  in  [his]  belief  that  was  wholly  indubitable."1 
On  the  same  page,  however,  he  remarks  "that,  in 
relation  to  practice,  it  is  sometimes  necessary  to  adopt, 
as  if  above  doubt,  opinions  which  we  discover  to  be 
highly  uncertain."  2  This  is  by  way  of  explanation 
of  the  fact  that  he  had  framed  certain  rules  for  his 
guidance  in  the  world  before  he  had  convinced  him- 
self that  there  was  any  world,  or  that  the  rules  would 
always  lead  him  aright.  For  example,  he  determined 
in  ordinary  affairs  to  act  and  believe  as  did  men  in 
general  around  him,  thereby,  of  course  adopting 
moderate  rather  than  radical  views.  Yet  he  did  not 
know  that  the  moderate  views  would  prove  true. 
Another  of  his  maxims  was,  to  hold  firmly  to  his 
course,  in  other  than  scientific  matters,  both  in  action 
and  opinions  regardless  of  doubts.3  Yet  he  could 
not  deny  that  this  course  might  lead  him  into  error. 

1  "Method,"  Pt.  IV.  *  Cf.  id.,  Pt.  III. 

s  Id.,  Pt.  III.  His  third  practical  maxim  was  the  Stoical  one  of 
adjusting  himself  to  circumstances  whenever  he  could  not  shape 
these  to  his  liking. 

195 


196  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

The  justification  of  it  was,  that  it  would  lead  him 
somewhere,  while  a  vacillating  course  was  likely  to 
lead  nowhere. 

These  maxims  he  felt  it  to  be  sound  wisdom  to 
adopt  for  the  reason  that  in  practical  affairs  he  was 
not  free — as  he  was  in  scientific  matters — to  give 
full  rein  to  doubt,  and  make  the  pursuit  of  indubit- 
able reality  his  supreme  aim.  In  order  to  investigate 
at  all,  it  was  necessary  first  to  live; 4  and  life  makes 
immediate  demands  upon  us,  demands  which  must 
be  met  somehow  in  the  present,  not  after  we  have 
made  all  the  inquiries  which  logically  precede  them. 
Hence  Descartes  adopted  his  prudent  maxims,  each 
of  which  from  the  point  of  view  of  his  principle  of 
rigor  involved  an  assumption. 

This  situation  was  not  peculiar  to  him.  All  men 
of  science  are  obliged  to  make  assumptions.  They 
cannot  begin  their  investigations  at  the  foundations 
of  the  universe,  and  refuse  to  believe  anything,  or 
to  act  as  though  they  believed  anything,  until  every 
fact  and  principle  from  the  bottom  up  is  demon- 
strated to  their  satisfaction.  They  find  themselves 
in  the  world  in  the  thick  of  action  and  belief.  Life 
has  been  going  on  for  untold  ages.  When  the  in- 
quirer begins  to  think  critically,  he  already  has  a 
considerable  stock  of  beliefs,  some  of  which  are  theo- 
retical (opinions),  but  others  of  which  are  practical, 
that  is,  beliefs  on  which  he  acts.  Later,  after  he  has 

4Cf.  the  remark  of  Dr.  F.  C.  S.  Schiller  as  to  "the  sangfroid  of 
Descartes  when  he  set  himself  to  doubt  methodically  everything 
that  existed,  but  resolved  meanwhile  not  to  change  his  dinner- 
hour!" — "Studies  in  Humanism,"  p.  395. 


POSTULATES  197 

pushed  his  inquiries  far  and  wide  in  a  critical  spirit, 
he  is  often  able  to  look  back  and  see  that  some  of  the 
conceptions  on  which  he  began  as  a  man  to  act  and 
as  a  scientist  to  experiment  were  more  or  less  errone- 
ous; but  this  he  could  not  see  in  advance.  He  had 
to  go  ahead,  using  the  ideas  that  seemed  to  him  true, 
or  most  likely  to  be  true.  On  the  other  hand,  some 
of  his  initial  ideas,  even  after  the  utmost  research,  he 
finds  indispensable  still,  and  that  albeit  they  are 
still  unproved.  They  are  indispensable  because  with- 
out them  he  cannot  justify  logically  the  scientific 
processes  which  have  led  him  to  repeated  discoveries. 
Such  needful  ideas,  taken  for  granted  at  the  outset, 
and  still  remaining  requisite  at  each  stage  of  inquiry, 
may  properly  be  called  the  basal  principles  of  science. 
As  we  saw  in  the  first  part  of  our  study,6  they  are 
not  primarily  its  discoveries,  nor  yet  its  methods; 
but  are  rather  in  a  way  a  part  of  its  data.  They  have 
been  variously  termed  axioms,  fundamental  assump- 
tions, and  ultimate  postulates. 

Axioms. — An  axiom  is  generally  defined  as  the 
statement  of  a  self-evident  truth,  such  as  the  asser- 
tion that  the  whole  is  greater  than  any  one  of  its 
parts.  Its  self-evidence,  that  is,  its  character  as 
immediate  knowledge,  is  what  distinguishes  it  from 
assumptions,  postulates,  and  hypotheses.  The  latter 
do  not  have  this  character,  but  are  entertained  pri- 
marily without  proof  of  any  kind,  and  without  be- 
ing regarded  as  parts  of  knowlege  proper.  Axioms 
are,  of  course,  accepted  by  science  without  ques- 
tion, and  used  as  parts  of  its  working  material.  They 

6  Cf .  p.  27  f,  supra. 


198  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

are  often  thought  to  be  uniquely  rational,  and  so 
essentially  different  from  immediate  knowledge,  (in- 
tuitions) of  the  sensory  sorts — colors,  sounds,  pres- 
sures, etc. — but  it  may  be  doubted  if  the  difference 
goes  farther  than  the  fact  that  they  are  immediate 
perceptions  of  relation,  while  sensory  intuitions  are 
immediate  perceptions  of  quality.  It  is  open  to 
question,  also,  whether  they  have  not  developed  as 
man  became  reflective  from  much  vaguer  relational 
perceptions  (in  primitive  man)  which  were  not 
immediate,  but  were  really  postulates  which  ex- 
perience increasingly  confirmed.  That  two  straight 
lines  in  a  plane  cannot  inclose  a  surface  may  well  have 
started  out  in  human  thought  as  a  mere  vague 
feeling,  a  feeling  which  for  a  score  or  more  of  genera- 
tions had  to  be  proved  in  experience  before  it  was 
fully  trusted.  Now,  of  course,  following  the  uniform 
experience  of  long  ages,  that  insight  has  become  a 
quasi-instinctive  functioning  of  our  minds  when  they 
reach  a  certain  maturity,  and  it  is  no  longer  a  postu- 
late but  an  axiom. 

Basal  Assumptions,  or  Fundamental  Postulates. — 
In  general  an  assumption  is,  of  course,  some  idea  or 
statement  which  is  accepted  as  true,  at  least  pro- 
visionally, without  proof.  Originally  a  postulate 
was  merely  a  preliminary  assumption  adopted  as  a 
means  of  deduction,  just  as  a  hypothesis  was  a 
working  assumption  adopted  as  a  means  of  explana- 
tion. Of  late,  following  the  German  usage,  it  has 
been  common  to  distinguish  the  postulate  somewhat 
further,  and  to  regard  it  as  a  preliminary  practical 
assumption.  That  is,  it  is  a  proposition  which 


POSTULATES  199 

asserts  without  proof  that  something  can  be  done. 
Thus  Euclid's  first  postulate  asserts  that  between 
any  two  points  a  straight  line  can  be  drawn. 

Making  use  of  this  distinction,  the  basal  ideas, 
or  fundamental  assumptions,  of  science  appear  to 
be  essentially  postulates.  They  are  preliminary 
practical  assumptions,  having  always  a  reference  to 
something  that  can  be  done.  The  postulate  of  the 
uniformity  of  nature,  for  example,  means  for  science 
that  the  world  is  so  constituted  that  upon  a  sufficient 
acquaintance  with  present  conditions  one  can  predict 
the  future,  that  is  can  count  on  the  future  behavior 
of  natural  objects. 

This  forward  pointing  of  the  mind  suggests  why 
fundamental  postulates  are  so  readily  accepted: 
(1)  For  one  thing,  they  appear  to  be  the  necessary 
starting  points  of  science  and  a  progressive  control 
of  nature;  and  we  are  very  loath  to  believe  that 
either  of  these  is  beyond  us.  In  other  words,  we 
have  so  much  at  stake  in  the  possibilities  offered  by 
the  postulates  that  we  are  ready  to  believe.  Faith  is 
an  instinctive  attitude  of  the  mind  when  progress 
is  in  question.  It  is  often  a  surprise  to  students  to 
find  that  faith  is  a  factor,  and  an  indispensable  one, 
in  scientific  knowledge;  but  the  fact  is  no  ground 
for  skepticism  or  destructive  criticism.  Man  as  an 
active  being  is  naturally  interested  in  and  drawn  to 
statements  that  offer  scope  for  action. 

(2)  A  further  reason  for  the  ready  acceptance  of 
scientific  postulates  is  that  as  practical  they  naturally 
lead  to  their  own  justification.  There  is,  of  course, 
a  hazard  in  accepting  without  proof  any  proposition 


200  BASAL   PRINCIPLES 

whatever;  but  in  the  case  of  assumptions  that 
seem  to  be  needful  for  imperative  practical  ends  it  is 
not  serious.  Since  they  refer  to  some  kind  of  action 
as  possible,  taking  them  so  to  speak  in  their  own 
spirit  is  to  act  upon  them,  and  so  to  test  them;  and 
that  is  speedily  to  ascertain  their  truth  (or  error), 
or  at  least  their  validity.  In  other  words,  an  assump- 
tion which  points  to  a  line  of  action  (a  postulate) 
does  not  need  a  priori  proof,  because  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  is  so  susceptible  of  proof,  or  at  least  con- 
firmation, a  postiori.  The  successful  application 
of  it  is  its  vindication.  It  was  in  this  spirit  that 
Columbus  made  his  memorable  voyage.  He  did 
not,  and  could  not,  wait  until  the  sphericity  of  the 
earth  was  scientifically  demonstrated;  for  his  voyage 
(or  its  equivalent)  was  an  important  and  perhaps 
indispensable  part  of  the  scientific  demonstration. 
In  this  respect  the  great  explorer  was  typical  of  the 
man  of  science,  who  is  very  ready  to  act  upon  practi- 
cal assumptions.  The  unknown  is  so  attractive  that 
he  is  ready  to  try  any  plan,  that  is,  act  on  any  assump- 
tion, which  gives  promise  of  leading  to  it.  Thereby 
he,  of  course,  puts  a  certain  tentative  faith  in  them 
in  advance  of  proof,6  but  in  the  long  run  he  finds  that 
such  cautious  belief  giving  is  abundantly  justified 
by  the  results  gained. 

The  faith  attitude  toward  practical  assumptions 
that  appear  to  be  useful  is,  of  course,  not  peculiar 
to  science,  but  is  characteristic  of  life  in  general. 

*  Indeed,  every  experiment  may  be  regarded  as  a  concrete  (pro- 
visional) postulate.  It  says  in  act — at  least  until  the  outcome  dis- 
proves it — this  procedure  will  effect  the  desired  result. 


POSTULATES  201 

In  perception  we  trust  our  senses  until  we  find  some 
reason  to  doubt  them,  while  in  commerce  and  in- 
dustry we  form  conclusions  as  to  the  future  upon 
which  we  act,  although  aware  that  they  may  be 
erroneous.  The  manufacturer  works  up  raw  material 
into  goods,  with  only  probability  as  to  future  demand 
to  guide  him,  and  the  merchant  sends  forth  ship-loads 
of  valuable  freight  with  no  absolute  guarantee 
against  hurricane  or  reef  or  collision,  and  the  nation 
builds  a  ship-canal  between  two  great  bodies  of 
water,  although  it  cannot  prove  that  its  ditches  and 
dams  will  withstand  the  untried  strains  upon  them, 
nor  indeed  that  ocean  currents  and  lunar  influences 
will  be  in  the  future  just  what  they  have  been  hi  the 
past. 

It  thus  appears  that  the  field  of  science  proper, 
that  is,  of  sure  processes  and  clear,  verified,  universal 
knowledge,  is  quite  a  limited  one,  a  field  set  between 
two  other  domains  in  each  of  which  knowledge  shades 
off  into  belief;  namely,  the  domain  of  common 
life  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other  that  of  funda- 
mental metaphysical  ideas,  or  ultimate  convictions 
as  to  the  universe. 


1.  In  what  sciences  do  the  following  non-fundamental  postu- 
lates lie  at  the  threshold  of  inquiry?  Point  out  in  each  case  how 
they  come  to  be  assumed: — 

(1)  The  processes  of  a  living  body  are  to  be  explained  by  the 

properties  and  laws  of  matter. 

(2)  Through  any  two  points  a  straight  line  can  be  drawn. 

(3)  All  material  things  may  be  regarded  as  constituted  of 


202  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

one  or  more  of  some  fourscore  natural  substances 
called  elements. 

(4)  All  mechanical  phenomena  may  be  described  in  terms 

of  matter,  motion,  space,  and  tune. 

(5)  The  movements  of  the  heavenly  bodies  are  to  be  inter- 

preted by  the  physical  laws  known  to  hold  good  on 
the  earth. 

(6)  The  changes  which  the  earth  has  undergone  in  the  re- 

mote past  are  to  be  interpreted  by  the  processes  now 
at  work  in  it. 

(7)  The  mental  processes  of  other  men  are  to  be  understood 

by  a  critical  study  of  one's  own  thinking. 

2.  On  what  explorer's  postulate  did  Stanley  proceed  in  his 
famous  journey  across  equatorial  Africa  westward  from  Lake 
Tanganyika.    Show  in  what  sense  the  postulate  was  a  mental 
venture,  and  what  was  the  justification  of  that  venture. 

3.  What  is  the  implicit  postulate  of  the  ship  captain  who  puts 
forth  on  the  ocean,  it  may  be  under  persistently  cloudy  skies, 
for  a  port  beyond  the  sea? 

4.  Give  five  examples  of  postulates  involved  in  other  human 
callings. 

5.  As  living,  growing,  and  aging  beings  men  are  continually 
acting  upon  a  fundamental  life  postulate.    State  that  postulate 
to  the  best  of  your  ability. 


CHAPTER  XII 
RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD 

The  primary  postulates  of  physical  science  seem 
to  be  four, — the  uniformity  of  nature,  the  rationality 
of  the  universe,  the  objective  reality  of  the  physical 
world,  and  the  actuality  of  space  and  time.  For 
our  purposes,  however,  it  will  be  convenient  to 
reduce  these  to  two,1  namely,  (1)  the  rationality 
of  the  world  and  (2)  its  objective  actuality. 

Rationality  of  the  World. — Physical  science  pro- 
ceeds on  the  working  basis  that  the  processes  of 
nature  are  comprehensible  by  the  human  mind. 
This  assumption  is  implicit  in  the  very  act  of  natural 
inquiry,  for,  if  one  believes  nature  cannot  be  under- 
stood he  will  not  undertake  the  toilsome  investiga- 
tions required  for  the  exploration  of  her  mysteries. 
The  ancient  Greek  philosophers  of  the  school  of 
Pyrrho,2  known  as  the  Skeptics,  together  with  the 
Sophists  3  before  them,  denied  that  men  were  capable 

1  Uniformity,  as  we  shall  see,  may  well  be  regarded  as  a  kind  of 
rationality,  while  the  objectivity  of  space  and  time  is  involved  in 
that  of  the  physical  world. 

1  Pyrrho  (abt.  360-abt.  270  B.  C.)  was  the  Greek  philosopher  who 
founded  the  ancient  skeptical  school.  He  taught  that  nothing  re- 
garding nature  or  life  could  be  really  known  and  that  wisdom  con- 
sisted in  a  suspense  of  judgment. 

3  The  Sophists  (or  wise  men)  were  the  first  thorough-going  phil- 
osophical critics.  They  arose  in  Grecian  lands  in  the  fifth  century, 
B.  C.,  after  the  close  of  the  Persian  war.  Their  motto  was,  "Know 
Thyself."  Protagoras  was  their  greatest  thinker  and  Socrates  their 
finest  product. 

203 


204  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

of  knowing  the  real  facts  and  truths  of  the  natural 
world,  and,  by  a  natural  consequence,  with  all  their 
acuteness  of  mind,  no  discoveries  in  natural  science 
are  to  be  placed  to  their  credit.  The  man  who 
(intentionally)  accomplishes  things  is  the  man  who 
believes  they  are  possible;  he  is,  in  a  sense,  the  man 
of  faith.  The  principle  of  rationality  is  therefore  a 
postulate  in  the  sense  adopted  in  the  last  chapter. 

In  the  inductive  processes  of  discovery  this  postu- 
late is  to  be  recognized  in  the  persistence  with  which 
scientific  thought  applies  hypothesis  after  hypothesis 
to  mysterious  phenomena.  Back  of  this  continual 
trying  at  nature's  puzzles  is  evidently  the  confidence 
that  some  form  of  human  thinking  will  be  found  to 
fit  the  facts;  or,  as  Professor  Huxley  once  expressed  it, 
the  confidence  that  "  nature  will  not  put  us  to  per- 
manent intellectual  confusion."  In  deductive  pro- 
cesses the  same  rationality  postulate  appears  in  the 
confidence  with  which  men  of  science  apply  its  laws, 
which  of  course  have  been  formed  by  themselves 
and  their  fellows,  to  new  cases  and  new  situations 
in  which  they  have  had  no  experience  of  then- validity. 
Mr.  Edison,  for  example,  went  through  long  periods 
of  patient  experimentation  in  the  belief  that,  if 
oxygen  could  be  excluded  from  Ins  lamp,  the  carbon 
filament  through  which  he  planned  to  pass  the 
electric  current  could  be  made  to  glow  indefinitely; 
yet  this  was  a  phenomenon  which  at  the  time  he  had 
never  witnessed.  He  believed  in  the  outcome,  be- 
cause he  had  confidence  that  the  laws  of  combustion 
were  parts  of  an  orderly  system. 

The  fundamental  idea  involved  in  the  notion  of 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      205 

rationality  seems  to  be  that  of  coherence  or  consist- 
ency. Certain  things  or  facts — both  objects  and  re- 
lations— are  impressed  upon  us  immediately  by  our 
mere  contact  with  the  world.  These  are  the  "im- 
pressions" and  customary  "conjunctions"  of  Hume, 
which  psychology  now  calls  sensations,  relational 
"fringe,"  and  empirical  associations;  and  they  con- 
stitute the  empirical  data  with  which  the  mind  works. 
As  data  they  are  non-rational,  or  "brute  facts  ";  but, 
as  it  has  often  happened  that  the  data  of  one  genera- 
tion have  been  analyzed  and  comprehended  by  the 
next  generation,  we  cannot  be  sure  that  our  present 
data  will  be  non-rational  for  those  who  come  after 
us.  With  these  as  a  basis,  comprehension  of  the 
world  seems  to  consist,  on  the  one  hand,  in  bringing 
these  data  into  a  kind  of  mental  accord,  and,  on  the 
other,  in  resolving  all  complex  facts  into  them;  as, 
for  example,  in  recognizing  in  salts,  acids,  and  bases 
simply  combinations  of  the  physical  data,  or  ele- 
ments, with  their  characteristic  reactions.  Intellect- 
ual comprehension  is  essentially  a  mental  linking  of 
part  with  part,  and  especially  of  the  new  with  the 
old,  so  that  the  mind  passes  easily,  and  with  content 
and  satisfaction,  from  the  familiar  to  the  unfamiliar, 
and  is  able  to  inclose  them  all  in  one  unitary  move- 
ment of  thought. 

When,  for  example,  do  we  feel  that  we  understand 
the  combustion  of  wood?  It  is  apparently  when  we 
come  to  see  in  the  process  the  union  of  three  relatively 
simple  elements — carbon  and  hydrogen,  on  the  one 
hand,  and  oxygen,  on  the  other.  We  think  of  these 
elements  as  acting  in  the  form  of  imperceptible 


206  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

units  (atoms),  each  of  the  first  two  kinds  uniting 
separately  with  the  third,  one  atom  of  carbon  joining 
itself  to  two  of  oxygen  and  two  of  hydrogen  to  one 
of  oxygen.  We  are  able  then  to  think  of  the  units 
as  being  themselves  unchanged  in  fundamental 
nature,  or  essence,  but  as  changing  their  behavior 
because  of  their  new  situation  or  conditions;  and 
this  kind  of  change  is  quite  in  accord  with  our  ex- 
perience in  the  more  familiar  situations  of  common 
life.  Men  and  animals,  of  course,  act  differently 
when  brought  into  association  with  their  fellows, 
and  so  also  do  objects  which  we  regard  as  inanimate. 
A  spool  will  roll  down  an  incline  if  alone,  but  not  if 
it  is  fastened  side  by  side  to  another  spool.  So  the 
needle  of  a  compass  points  normally  to  the  north, 
but  it  may  be  made  (without  contact)  to  point  in  any 
direction  by  bringing  another  magnetized  object 
near  to  it.  Even  the  heat  of  the  combustion  process 
finds  in  the  motion  concept  something  in  the  way  of 
a  familiar  analogue,  for  small  swiftly  moving  objects, 
such  as  flying  sand,  often  give  us  sensations  like  those 
of  heat. 

Now,  the  notable  thing  about  this  process  of 
mental  organization  and  coherent  system-making 
is  that  it  is  more  than  a  convenient  way  of  thinking 
our  data,  that  is,  holding  a  mass  of  facts  in  thought; 
it  is,  also,  under  the  guiding  principles  which  logic 
has  discovered,  a  means  of  reaching  new  facts.  The 
duly  criticised  demands  of  rationality  (at  least  in 
the  lower  meanings  of  the  term)  as  to  what  nature 
should  be  in  outlying  regions  as  yet  unreached  by 
experience  are  generally  honored  by  her  when  ex- 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      207 

perimental  research  subsequently  follows  the  path 
marked  out  by  deductive  thought  and  opens  up  those 
(hitherto)  unknown  fields.  For  example,  Newton 
held  that  a  beam  of  white  light  was  really  a  sheaf 
of  rainbow  colored  rays,  a  sheaf  which  an  interposed 
prism  merely  sorted  out  into  its  elements.  He 
argued  further  that,  if  a  second  prism  were  interposed 
in  the  path  of  any  one  of  the  elementary,  or  spectrum, 
rays  after  their  separation,  no  change  hi  the  color  of 
that  ray  would  be  effected, — a  rational  expectation 
of  his  which  was  actually  borne  out  in  the  experi- 
ments which  he  made  with  a  second  prism.  This 
kind  of  (deductive)  inference,  based  on  the  belief 
that  nature  is  rational,  is,  of  course,  an  integral  part 
of  all  inductive  inquiry  in  the  larger  sense  of  that 
term;  and  the  significant  thing  is  that,  when  duly 
guarded,  it  so  generally  works.  The  fact  that  it 
does  work  seems  to  involve  a  kind  of  accord,  or 
correspondence,  between  the  relations  of  things  to 
each  other  as  world  objects  and  our  own  instinctive 
mental  movements.  Our  minds  are  able  often 
evidently  to  trace  the  course  of  nature's  processes  in 
advance,4 — a  capability  in  them  which  may  probably 
be  attributed  to  the  fact  that  they  have  received 
so  large  a  part  of  their  training  through  contact 
with  the  natural  world.  To  some  extent  the  mind 
may  be  regarded  as  a  phonograph  upon  which  natural 
processes  write  their  story  (Hume's  concept  of 
mental  habit),  and  which  consequently  in  its  after 
workings  always  has  a  tendency  to  repeat  that  story. 

4  Lord  Bacon,  however,  condemned  all  attempts  to  "anticipate" 
nature. 


208  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

It  is  apparently  this  correspondence  of  natural 
processes  to  our  habitual  and  preferred  ways  of 
thinking  to  which  we  refer  when  we  pronounce 
nature  rational,  or  speak  of  the  thought  embodied 
in  the  universe.  It  is  much  the  same  thing  as  saying 
that  the  natural  world  is  a  comprehensible  order, 
that  is,  can  be  understood.  As  we  shall  see,  however, 
rationality  often  involves  also  the  notion  of  approba- 
tion. 

Different  Kinds  of  Rationality.— In  the  first 
part  of  our  study,  under  the  head  of  scientific 
analogy,  we  saw  that,  whenever  possible,  inter- 
pretative ideas — those  which  serve  to  make  facts 
rational  or  comprehensible — should  be  drawn  from 
the  same  field  as  the  phenomena  to  which  they  are 
applied;  but  we  were  obliged  to  recognize  that  this 
is  not  an  inflexible  rule,  since  it  is  not  always  possible. 
In  some  cases  there  are  no  such  ideas,  or  none  that 
are  adequate.  Indeed,  in  discussing  the  concept 
of  energy,  we  found  that,  though  it  is  used  freely 
in  physics,  the  idea  is  plainly  drawn  from  the  fields 
of  physiology  and  psychology;  that  is,  from  our 
personal  experience  of  effort  and  resistance.  Cor- 
responding to  this  difference  of  origin  in  our  inter- 
pretative ideas — that  is,  varying  according  to  the 
several  fields  from  which  they  are  drawn — there  are 
three  different  meanings  of  the  term,  rationality 
of  the  world: 

1.  The  universe  may  be  regarded  as  rational  when 
all  its  parts  are  susceptible  of  satisfactory  arrange- 
ment in  the  mind  by  the  use  of  ideas  drawn  from 
the  domain  of  physics.  Rationality  then  appears 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      209 

to  mean  that  the  world  is  orderly — so  fixed  in  its 
types  of  process  that  these  can  be  completely  de- 
scribed in  natural  laws  and  successfully  predicted  to 
the  smallest  detail.  In  this  sense  to  call  the  world 
rational  means  much  the  same  as  to  call  it  mechanical. 
It  means  that  the  world  is  an  adjusted,  regularly 
working  system,  characterized  everywhere  by  in- 
variable causal  relations. 

More  particularly  is  rationality,  when  conceived 
thus  under  the  analogies  of  physics,  substantially 
identical  with  the  principle  of  the  uniformity  of  nature, 
which  we  have  seen  to  be  an  essential  element  in 
the  principle  of  mechanism.  As  was  remarked  on  a 
preceding  page,5  the  uniformity  of  nature  is  an 
implicit  assumption  in  all  scientific  experiments. 
Without  it  science  would  be  impossible,  for  then  there 
would  be  no  universality  to  knowledge.6  If  nature 
were  not  uniform  in  her  activities,  then  what  we 
observed  to  occur  to-day  might  not,  under  precisely 
similar  conditions,  take  place  to-morrow.  The 
lightning  instead  of  being  a  spark  of  electricity, 
might  to-morrow  prove  to  be  a  flaming  bolt  of  iron! 
Investigation  of  nature  then  would  become  a  kind  of 
perilous  gambling.  But  science  evidently  is  possible; 
its  great  achievements  are  the  sufficient  evidence  of 
that  possibility.  It  is  plain,  therefore,  that  there  is 
validity  (working  value)  to  the  postulate  on  which  it 
rests — the  uniformity  of  nature. 

Yet  even  this  consideration  is  not  a  proof  of  the 
absolute  truth  of  the  principle.  Logically  it  remains 
a  postulate  still,  though  a  postulate  which  has  re- 

•  Cf.  p.  143,  supra.  •  Cf .  p.  27,  supra. 


210  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

ceived  so  much  confirmation 7  from  experience  that 
inquirers  now  regard  it  with  all  the  confidence  of  an 
empirically  discovered  principle  or  law.  We  cannot 
really  prove  it,  however;  and  this  for  two  reasons; 
— (1)  For  one  thing,  the  very  tests  which  we  apply 
to  phenomena  to  prove  their  uniformity  themselves 
assume  the  principle  of  uniformity.  They  assume, 
for  example,  that  our  senses — sight,  touch,  hearing 
— remain  essentially  the  same  from  day  to  day,  and 
that  our  standards  of  measurement — yard  sticks, 
water  grammes,  etc. — are  under  identical  conditions 
constant.  But  how  are  these  underlying  assumptions 
to  be  justified?  One  strives  in  vain  to  conceive  some 
way  of  proving  them  which  shall  not  itself  in  the  very 
process  assume  them. 

(2)  The  second  reason  is  that  dwelt  upon  by 
Hume,  to  the  effect  that  all  experiment,  in  the  nature 
of  the  case,  witnesses  merely  to  the  present  or,  when 
recalled  in  memory,  to  the  past.  It  cannot  point  to 
the  future  without  assuming  this  very  principle  of 
uniformity.  "As  to  past  experience"  says  Hume, 
"it  can  be  allowed  to  give  direct  and  certain  informa- 
tion of  those  precise  objects  only,  and  that  precise 
period  of  time,  which  fell  under  its  cognizance:  but 
why  this  experience  should  be  extended  to  future 
times,  and  to  other  objects,  which,  for  all  we  know, 
may  be  only  in  appearance  similar;  that  is  the  main 
question  on  which  I  would  insist."8  Indeed,  Hume's 

1  And  eo  much  suggestion,  also,  for  how  regular  and  predictable 
are  the  successions  of  day  and  night,  of  the  moon's  phases,  of  spring, 
summer,  etc.! 

1  "Enquiry,"  etc.,  Sec.  IV,  Pt.  1. 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      211 

query  might  be  made  more  radical  still;  for  how, 
without  assuming  uniformity,  can  we  know  that  even 
when  the  objects  are  precisely  similar,  they  will 
behave  as  we  have  observed  them  to  behave  in  the 
past?  There  appears  to  be  no  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion. We  seem  to  be  forced  to  content  ourselves  with 
the  assumption  that  they  will  behave  in  the  same  way 
in  the  future.  At  bottom,  therefore,  uniformity  is 
a  postulate,  a  practical  assumption  adopted  because 
it  is  needed.9 

2.  Rationality,  in  the  sense  just  explained, — the 
principle  of  a  worldwide  interconnection  of  things 
in  a  way  that  is  orderly  from  the  point  of  view  of 
ordinary  physics — is  all  that  the  scientific  postulate 
of  rationality  necessarily  and  unhesitatingly  predi- 
cates, and  all  that  some  men  of  science  seem  to  mean 
by  the  term.  In  the  higher  grades  of  existence, 
however,  it  seems  clearly  inadequate.  It  fails  to 
meet  all  our  requirements  of  a  rational  world.  To 
say,  for  example,  that  the  gastric  juice  exudes  from 
the  walls  of  the  stomach,  when  food  enters  that 
organ,  because  the  minute  glands  in  which  it  is  con- 
tained push  it  forth,  and  that  these  glands  are  them- 
selves constricted  by  certain  muscles,  and  the  mus- 
cles aroused  to  action  by  certain  nerves,  is  to  give  a 
useful  explanation  of  this  part  of  digestion,  so  far 
as  it  goes,  but  it  is  by  no  means  to  give  a  full  explana- 
tion. Nor  does  it  seem  that  such  an  inquiry  into 

9  Cf .  Professor  Bain's  remark  as  to  this  principle  (Logic,  Appendix 
D).  "Without  it  we  can  do  nothing;  with  it  we  can  do  anything. 
Our  only  error  is  in  proposing  to  give  any  reason  or  justification  of  it, 
to  treat  it  otherwise  than  as  begged  at  the  very  outset." 


212  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

causal  antecedents,  however  far  it  may  be  carried, 
can  ever  content  the  mind.  For  a  truly  rational  ac- 
count of  the  functions  of  the  stomach  we  need  to 
know,  also,  what  end  the  flow  of  the  gastric  juice 
serves — the  final  cause.  The  mind  probably  is 
never  satisfied  with  any  explanation  of  organized 
activity  which  does  not  reveal  the  use  of  that  ac- 
tivity— the  value  there  is  in  it. 

In  biology  and  psychology,  therefore,  not  to  speak 
of  sociology  and  ethics,  we  instinctively  resort  to  a 
second  meaning  of  the  term,  rationality  of  the  world. 
This  is  a  teleological  one,  the  idea  of  such  an  adjustment 
of  objects  or  parts  to  one  another  as  is  fitted  to  bring 
about  some  end  or  ends.  We  are  accustomed  to  pass 
judgment  upon  systems — engines,  living  things, 
institutions,  etc. — according  as  they  are,  or  are  not, 
put  together  so  as  to  effect  the  result  in  view.  In  so 
far  as  their  features  lack  adjustment  to  the  end  of 
their  existence,  so  far  are  they,  and  especially  the 
features  referred  to,  irrational.  Thus  the  vestigial 
organs  in  the  human  frame,  such  as  the  troublesome 
vermiform  appendix,  are  rational  in  the  first  sense  of 
the  word,  since  they  are  the  results  of  orderly  causal 
processes,  and  are  entirely  predictable;  but,  in  so 
far  as  they  now  hinder  the  development  of  the  or- 
ganic type  and  interfere  with  its  well-being,  they  are 
irrational  in  this  second  sense.  An  intelligent  maker 
of  such  organisms,  at  least  if  he  had  only  the  produc- 
tion of  successful  organic  types  in  view,  would,  if 
able,  have  eliminated  these  features  ages  ago.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  many  wonderful  devices  in  the 
living  organism  for  overcoming  disease,  destroying 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      213 

harmful  bacteria,  and  restoring  injured  parts  to 
health,  are  all  eminently  rational  in  the  teleological 
sense.  They  all  serve  the  one  great  end  of  maintain- 
ing the  organism  in  vigor.  It  is  evident  that  in  this 
sense  of  the  term  there  is  a  large  amount  of  rationality 
in  the  world;  things  are  adjusted  to  the  realization  of 
ends  on  a  vast  scale;  but  it  is  evident,  also,  that  the 
rationality  is  far  from  complete.  It  is  something  to  be 
expected,  but  also  something  for  which  at  times  we 
search  in  vain. 

In  this  teleological  or  end-serving  sense,  also,  ra- 
tionality is,  and  it  would  seem  must  remain,  a  postu- 
late, and  that  for  both  science  and  ethics.  It  cannot 
be  proved,  because  of  the  fragmentariness  of  our 
knowledge.  The  indications  point  strongly  to  the 
conclusion  that  we  know  but  a  small  part  of  the  order 
of  nature,  our  ignorance  far  surpassing  our  knowledge. 
The  fact  that  we  are  able  to  understand  part  of  the 
world  is  no  proof  that  the  larger  part  unknown  to  us 
would  be  intelligible,  if  our  inquiries — with,  let  us 
say,  ideal  conditions — were  pushed  to  the  utmost 
limit  of  human  capacity.  On  the  contrary,  it  is 
quite  possible  that  much  of  the  unknown  beyond 
is  unknown  just  because  it  is  essentially  incompre- 
hensible to  human  intelligence.  On  the  other  hand, 
neither  can  tJiefull  rationality  of  ttie  world  be  disproved, 
though  Herbert  Spencer,  Du  Bois  Reymond,10  and 
the  philosophical  positivists  have  made  strenuous 
attempts  in  that  direction.  The  only  conclusive 

10  A  noted  German  physicist;  his  famous  lecture  on  the  "Limits 
of  the  Knowledge  of  Nature"  is  perhaps  the  strongest  plea  yet  made 
in  this  direction. 


214  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

proof  as  to  the  reach  of  human  powers  of  knowledge 
is  the  final  result  of  a  vigorous  and  persistent  use  of 
them  to  the  end,  and  that  test  will  not  be  complete 
until  the  race  is  extinct! 

In  the  meantime  our  opinions  on  this  subject  must 
remain  matters  of  philosophic  faith.  We  may  prop- 
erly enough  believe  with  Leibniz  n  that  the  world 
throughout  is  soluble  to  reason  of  the  human  sort, 
and  that  a  mind  of  the  first  order  with  adequate 
facilities  would  discern  a  sufficient  reason  why  every- 
thing in  the  world  is  as  it  is  and  not  otherwise,  though 
this  belief  is  less  easy  now  than  it  was  before  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  doctrine  of  natural  selection.  On 
the  other  hand,  we  are  free  to  believe,  with  Mr. 
Spencer,  that,  however  comprehensible  the  world 
might  be  for  a  superhuman  or  divine  intelligence, 
much  of  it  is  essentially  and  forever  beyond  the 
reach  of  even  the  highest  human  understanding. 
Finally,  with  the  philosophical  school  of  Schopen- 
hauer,12 we  may  hold  that  existence  is  essentially 
irrational,  the  intelligence  of  men  and  animals,  and 
perhaps  even  the  uniformity  of  natural  processes, 
being  but  incidental  and  temporary  phases  in  the 
endless  life  of  a  blind  pulsating  world  Power  or 
powers.  This  last  view,  which  when  first  broached 

11  Leibniz  (1646-1716)  was  a  brilliant  German  mathematician 
and  philosopher.  He  was  the  inventor  of  the  calculus,  and  the 
author  of  an  idealistic  and  strongly  individualistic  metaphysical 
system. 

11  Schopenhauer,  Arthur  (1788-1860),  the  fourth  and  last  of  the 
great  idealists  who  succeeded  Kant,  departed  from  his  predecessors 
by  laying  chief  stress  on  the  will,  not  the  intellect.  He  is  noted  as 
the  foremost  occidental  exponent  of 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      215 

by  Schopenhauer  nearly  a  century  ago  was  generally 
regarded  as  bizarre  and  absurd,  has  of  late,  in  con- 
nection with  the  increasing  prominence  of  the  con- 
cept of  energy,  gained  greatly  in  acceptability  and 
vogue. 

3.  There  is  still  a  third  meaning  of  the  word,  ra- 
tionality. It  is  that  of  conformable  to  valuable  ends, 
as  these  are  estimated  by  our  human  experience  of 
value.  When  in  a  court  of  law  inquiry  is  made  into 
the  sanity  of  a  man,  it  is  not  sufficient  to  show  that 
he  can  reason  to  a  conclusion,  or  use  his  limbs  effec- 
tively for  the  promotion  of  ends  chosen  by  him.  He 
is  not  regarded  as  rational  unless  the  conclusions 
which  hi  all  sincerity  he  reaches,  and  the  things 
which  with  honest  conviction  he  does,  are  such  as 
are  tolerable  to  society  at  large.  If  men  in  general 
are  so  averse  to  his  conclusions  and  his  acts  that 
they  cannot  endure  them,  he  is  considered  insane, 
or  at  least  unsound  in  mind,  that  is,  irrational.  In 
this  case  it  is  not  merely  the  presence  of  end-serving 
activity  which  is  considered  in  determining  ration- 
ality, but  also,  and  mainly,  the  nature  of  the  end 
sought,  whether  it  is  one  to  be  approved;  and  the 
conception  of  rationality  involved  is  derived,  not 
from  physics,  nor  yet  from  biology,  but  from  the 
field  of  ethics  and  conscious  life. 

When  we  ask  if  the  world  is  rational  in  this  third 
sense,  science  can  return  only  an  agnostic  answer; 
for  it  finds  no  clear  evidence — certainly  no  proof — of 
general  world  adjustments  to  ends  that  satisfy  the 
mind's  demands  as  to  value.  Full  many  individual 
scientists  believe  that  the  world  is  thus  rational,  that 


216  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

it  has  a  worthy  conscious  purpose  directing  it;  but 
it  is  a  matter  of  faith  with  them,  and  not  a  principle 
which  can  be  established.  There  appears  to  be  but 
one  end  of  the  world  process  that  satisfies  human 
thought,  and  that  is  the  production  of  a  high  type 
of  personality  in  conscious  beings.  But  the  indiv- 
idual development  reached  by  the  highest  order  of 
conscious  beings  known  to  us — mankind — and  the 
satisfactions  gained  by  man  here  in  his  brief,  blunder- 
ing, and  suffering  career,  do  not  suffice  to  justify 
either  the  age-long  preparatory  stages  nor  full  often 
the  grievous  ills  of  existence.  The  man  who  faces 
the  facts  of  human  life  as  a  whole,  with  its  sin  and 
folly  and  woe,  and  who  gets  into  sympathetic  touch 
with  the  vast  multitudes  of  the  unfavored,  or  com- 
mon, people,  is  very  likely  to  become  pessimistic, 
at  least  so  long  as  he  confines  his  outlook  to  the 
present  life.  Some  degree  of  pessimism  is  thus  one 
natural  result  of  bringing  the  test  of  rationality  in  its 
highest  form  to  bear  upon  our  world,  for  the  world 
certainly  meets  it  but  ill.  The  one  end  approved  by 
reason  is  not  attained  by  the  vast  majority,  nor, 
the  world  being  what  it  is,  does  one  see  how  it  can  be. 
Most  men,  of  course,  do  not  confine  their  view  to 
the  present  life,  but  believe,  rightly  or  wrongly,  that 
human  existence  survives  death,  and  continues  on 
higher  planes  hereafter.  The  eminent  philosopher 
Kant  was  one  of  these.  Indeed,  he  maintained  that 
the  imperfection  and  fragmentariness  of  the  present 
life  was  evidence  that  personal  existence  did  not  end 
at  bodily  death.  He  felt  that  the  world  must  be 
teleologically  rational — organized  so  as  hi  some  way 


RATIONALITY  OF  THE  WORLD      217 

to  meet  the  demands  of  our  highest  natures — and  that 
consequently  a  future  life  for  the  vindication  of  that 
rationality  was  an  inevitable  conclusion.13  At  this 
point  we  come  to  the  confines  of  religion,  which  is  a 
field  lying  beyond  the  scope  of  this  book.  Yet  it  is 
proper  to  add  that  one  who  believes  in  immortality 
is  able  also  to  believe  that  the  world  is  rational  in 
this  third  and  highest  sense;  for  he  is  able  to  look 
upon  all  human  infirmity  on  earth  as  but  an  inter- 
mediate and  preparatory  stage  in  the  individual's 
long  development  toward  the  ideal,  and  upon  the 
woes  of  the  present  life  as  but  the  means  whereby  a 
future  higher  and  happier  personality  is  being 
brought  into  existence,  in  fact  as  the  birth  pangs  of 
a  worthier  type  of  man. 


EXERCISES 

1.  Give  five  examples  in  which  the  uniformity  of  nature  is 
postulated  by  men  in  practical  life. 

2.  State  five  concrete  cases  in  which  it  is  postulated  by  men  of 
science. 

3.  Describe  five  or  more  natural  processes  which  indicate 
adaptation  of  means  to  an  end — regardless  of  whether  the  end 
is  good  and  sufficient. 

4.  State  two  cases  of  seeming  irrationality  in  nature  because 
of  uselessncss  of  parts  or  of  hindrance  to  the  realization  of  what 
seems  to  be  the  natural  end. 

5.  Show  how  the  assassins  of  Pros.  Garfield  and  the  would-be 

13  Cf.  "Grit,  of  the  Prac.  Reason,"  II,  chap.  II,  sec.  4.  Kant, 
Immanuel  (1724-1804),  was  a  professor  at  the  University  of  Kttnigs- 
berg,  Prussia,  for  over  thirty  years.  He  founded  the  critical  school 
of  philosophy,  and  by  many  is  regarded  as  the  greatest  philosopher 
since  Aristotle. 


218  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

assassin  of  ex-Pres.  Roosevelt  were  rational  in  the  first  two 
senses  of  the  term  but  not  in  the  third  sense. 

6.  From  what  point  of  view — that  is,  on  what  political  postu- 
lates— might  the  assassins  of  Presidents  Lincoln  and  McKinley 
be  held  to  be  rational  in  all  three  senses? 

7.  Make  a  careful  summary  of  Kant's  argument  for  immor- 
tality on  the  assumption  of  the  full  rationality  of  the  world. 
("Practical  Reason,"  chap.  II  to  sec.  4.) 

8.  Do  the  same  with  John  Fiske's  "Destiny  of  Man,"  pp.  96- 
119. 

9.  Do  the  same  with  Smyth's  "Through  Science  to  Faith," 
chap.  XII. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD 

Postulate  of  External  Actuality. — Another  major 
postulate  of  physical  science  is  the  actuality  of  the 
external  world.  Science  joins  with  common  life  in 
assuming  for  practical  purposes  that  the  physical 
objects  with  which  it  deals — stars,  waters,  minerals, 
etc. — have  some  sort  of  existence  in  themselves,  apart 
from  man's  thinking  about  them.  It  does  not  pre- 
tend to  know  what,  for  example,  a  piece  of  iron  is  in 
itself,  still  less  to  account  for  its  absolute  origination, 
if  such  a  thing  ever  occurred;  but  it  proceeds  on  the 
working  assumption  that  the  iron  is  as  truly  an  ex- 
istence, with  established  forms  of  behavior,  as  is  the 
individual  that  studies  it  and  uses  it.  The  student 
should  carefully  distinguish  this  postulate,  which 
perhaps  seems  to  him  a  mere  useless  truism,  from 
any  metaphysical  affirmation  as  to  the  nature  of 
physical  objects.  Science  does  not  teach  that  so- 
called  external  objects  are  really  external  to  the  mind. 
Such  a  teaching  would  be  philosophical,  not  scientific, 
for  it  cannot  be  experimentally  verified.  It  would  be 
metaphysical  realism.  Science  simply  affirms  that 
we  can  treat  those  objects  as  though  they  had  a  more  or 
less  independent  existence  of  their  own  *  and  in  so 

1Cf.  Whetham,   "Recent  Develop,  of  Phys.   Science,"   p.  44: 
"While  natural  science  is  not  committed  to  any  particular  philosophi- 
cal system  ...  the  language  it  uses  habitually  is  based  on  the 
219 


220  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

treating  them  we  will  not  be  brought  to  confusion, 
but  will  be  able  to  use  them  for  the  purposes  of 
thought  and  life. 

Involved  in  this  working  assumption  is  the  like 
postulate  of  the  objective  actuality  of  space  and  time. 
As  we  have  seen,  all  material  things  have  extension, 
which  means  that  they  exist  in  space.  If  they  are 
to  be  treated  as  objectively  actual,  space  likewise 
must  be  treated  as  actual.  So,  also,  as  to  tune.  Every 
event  takes  place  in  time;  and  if  the  objects  con- 
cerned in  these  events,  together  with  their  behavior, 
are  to  be  treated  as  actual,  there  seems  to  be  no  rea- 
son for  treating  otherwise  the  time  periods  in  which 
the  behavior  occurs. 

When  we  pass,  however,  from  the  domain  of  science 
to  that  of  philosophy,  we  find  external  actuality  by 
no  means  universally  conceded.  It  is  anything  but 
a  truism  in  metaphysics.  From  the  time  of  the  Eng- 
lish philosopher,  Berkeley,2  nearly  two  hundred 
years  ago,  it  has  been  a  disputed  question  whether 
there  is  any  actual  external  world,  that  is,  any  exis- 
tences that  are  non-physical,  unthinking,  and  unfeel- 
ing. Nor  is  this  question  a  mere  cavil,  a  trifling, 
negligible  objection  raised  against  received  opinion. 
It  has  been  seriously  answered  in  the  negative  by 
men  of  large  ability. 

common  sense  realism,  which  is  the  philosophical  creed  of  most  men 
of  science.  .  .  .  But  science  talks  of  matter  and  energy  as  though  it 
knew  of  the  existence  of  realities  corresponding  with  the  mental 
images,"  etc. 

1  Berkeley,  George  (1685-1753),  was  an  Irish  prelate  of  the 
Anglican  church.  He  is  the  foremost  representative  of  subjective 
idealism. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  221 

It  was  urged  by  Berkeley  himself  with  utmost 
zeal  and  conviction  that  all  existence  is  spiritual,  and 
that  the  whole  notion  of  non-spiritual  existence  is 
illogical  and  illegitimate.  "It  is  evident,"  he  says, 
"to  any  one  who  takes  a  survey  of  the  objects  of  hu- 
man knowledge  that  they  are  either  ideas  actually 
imprinted  on  the  senses;  or  else  such  as  are  perceived 
by  attending  to  the  passions  and  operations  of  the 
mind;  or,  lastly,  ideas  formed  by  help  of  memory  and 
imagination  ...  As  several  of  these  are  observed 
to  accompany  each  other,  they  come  to  be  marked 
by  one  name,  and  so  to  be  reputed  as  one  thing. 
Thus,  for  example,  a  certain  color,  taste,  smell,  figure, 
and  consistence  having  been  observed  to  go  together 
are  accounted  one  distinct  thing,  signified  by  the 
name  apple."  3  A  physical  object  is  thus  for  Berke- 
ley an  established,  or  recurrent,  cluster  of  sensations. 
"That  neither  our  thoughts,"  he  adds,  "nor  passions, 
nor  ideas  formed  by  the  imagination,  exist  without 
the  mind,  is  what  every  body  will  allow.  And  it 
seems  no  less  evident  that  the  various  sensations  or 
ideas  imprinted  on  the  sense,  however  blended  or 
combined  together  (that  is,  whatever  objects  they 
compose)  cannot  exist  otherwise  than  in  a  mind 
perceiving  them  ...  As  to  what  is  said  of  the  abso- 
lute existence  of  unthinking  things  without  any 
relation  to  their  being  perceived,  that  seems  perfectly 
unintelligible.  Their  esse  is  percipi  ....  What  do 

'"Principles  of  Hu.  Knowledge,"  fl.  The  reader  of  Berkeley 
should  constantly  bear  in  mind  that  for  him  "idea"  always  means 
some  kind  of  image,  either  of  sense  or  of  imagination,  and  not  a 
concept,  or  notion. 


222  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

we  perceive  besides  our  own  ideas  or  sensations?  and 
is  it  not  plainly  repugnant  that  any  one  of  these,  or 
any  combination  of  them,  should  exist  unperceived?  4 

The  outcome  of  Berkeley's  argument  is  that  the 
physical  world  is  entirely  ideal,  that  is,  constructed  of 
ideas  (images),  the  constructor  being  either  the  mind 
which  knows  them,  as  in  the  play  of  imagination,  or 
that  mind  in  connection  with  some  other  mind,  as  in 
human  intercourse.  Only  mind  (spirit)  is  truly  real, 
an  existence  in  itself.  Material  objects  are  "collec- 
tions of  ideas,"  and  ideas  are  always  and  necessarily 
the  product  of  mind.  They  are  as  distinctly  and  en- 
tirely the  results  of  the  mind's  activity  as  are  the 
pictures  of  a  magic  lantern  or  kinetoscope  the  results 
of  the  machine's  activity.  Of  course,  ideas  can  be 
shared  by  two  or  more  minds;  that  is,  one  mind  may 
lead  another  mind  to  think  similar  thoughts.  This 
is  supremely  true  in  the  case  of  God  and  man.  God's 
fixed  thoughts  are  what  we  call  the  objects  of  nature; 
and  knowledge  of  natural  objects  (ordinary  sense 
perception)  really  consists  in  coming  into  contact 
with  the  mind  of  God  and  sharing  his  thoughts, 
though  these  being  orderly,  permanent,  and  univer- 
sal, we  too  often  do  not  recognize  them  as  thoughts. 
This  theory  of  Berkeley  is  the  core  of  the  type  of 
modern  philosophy  known  as  idealism,5  though  most 
idealists  now  differ  with  him  as  to  the  conception  of 
God. 

Berkeley's  argument  rests  on  an  assumption  which 

4  Id.,  H1f  3,  4. 

8Cf.  Royce's  "Spirit  of  Mod.  Philos.,"  lee.  XI,  for  an  excellent 
example  of  this  type  of  thinking. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  223 

it  never  occurred  to  him  to  question,  an  assumption 
which  was  the  common  presupposition6  of  the  reflec- 
tive thought  of  his  time.  This  was  the  conception 
that  all  knowledge  is  an  awareness  of  our  own  ideas, 
or  images.  This  view,  no  doubt,  seemed  necessitated 
to  many  by  the  fact  that  the  mind  appeared  to  be 
mysteriously  hid  below  the  surface  of  the  body  (hi 
the  brain)  and  never  to  come  into  actual  contact 
with  external  objects.  Whatever  object  came  before 
it  must  therefore  be  within  the  body,  that  is,  must  be 
either  a  sensory  or  a  reproductive  image.  This  view 
was  naturally  reenforced  by  the  familiar  perception 
errors,  which  seemed  to  indicate  that  the  mind  in  per- 
ception was  not  dealing  with  actual  objects,  but 
with  representations,  or  images,  of  them.  This 
consideration  impressed  Hume  deeply.  "The  slight- 
est philosophy,"  he  says,  "teaches  us  that  nothing 
can  ever  be  presented  to  the  mind  but  an  image  or 
perception,  and  that  the  senses  are  only  the  inlets 
through  which  these  images  are  conveyed,  without 
being  able  to  produce  any  immediate  intercourse 
between  the  mind  and  the  object.  The  table  which 
we  see  seems  to  diminish  as  we  remove  farther  from 
it:  but  the  real  table,  which  exists  independently  of 
us,  suffers  no  alteration;  it  was  therefore  nothing  but 
an  image  which  was  present  to  the  mind.  These  are 
the  obvious  dictates  of  reason;  and  no  man  who 
reflects  ever  doubted  that  the  existences  which  we 

•A  presupposition  is  an  assumption  or  postulate  which  is  ac- 
cepted on  the  authority  of  prior  inquiries.  Often  presuppositions 
are  the  established  empirical  principles  of  a  more  elementary  science. 
Thus,  the  laws  of  physics  are  presuppositions  for  biology. 


224  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

consider  when  we  say,  this  house  and  that  tree,  are 
nothing  but  the  perceptions  in  the  mind,  and  fleeting 
copies  or  representations  of  other  existences,  which 
remain  uniform  and  independent."  7  It  will  be  ob- 
served that  Hume  concurs  with  Berkeley's  argu- 
ments,8 but  does  not  reach  Berkeley's  conclusion. 
On  the  contrary,  he  assumes  that  there  are  real,  non- 
psychic  existences,  though  we  never  perceive  them. 
This  is  a  very  serious  argument,  and  one  that  will 
bear  much  reflection.  There  is  a  difficulty  in  it, 
however.  If  "nothing  but  an  image "  is  ever  "present 
to  the  mind,"  how  can  we  possibly  know  that 
beyond  the  images,  and  represented  by  them,  there 
are  "other  existences,  which  remain  uniform  and 
independent?"  Hume  confesses  this  difficulty  on  the 
next  page.  "Here,"  he  says,  "experience  is,  and 
must  be,  entirely  silent.  The  mind  has  never  any- 
thing present  to  it  but  the  perceptions,  and  cannot 
possibly  reach  any  experience  of  their  connection  with 
objects.  The  supposition  of  such  a  connection  is 
therefore  without  any  foundation  in  reasoning." 
He  concludes  that  at  this  point  "the  profounder  and 
more  philosophical  skeptics  will  always  triumph;" 
that  is,  will  show  that  belief  in  the  external  world  is 
rationally  unfounded.  For  himself  Hume  takes  ref- 
uge in  what  he  calls  a  "mitigated  or  academical  skep- 
ticism," which  bids  us,  on  the  one  hand,  confess  that 
theoretically  we  do  not  know  that  any  physical  ex- 
ternal world  exists,  but,  on  the  other,  acts  as  practical 

»  "Enquiry,"  etc.,  Sec.  XII,  Pt.  1. 

8  As  to  these  his  judgment  is  "that  they  admit  of  no  answer  and 
produce  no  conviction." 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  225 

beings  on  the  common  sense  postulate  of  its  actual 
presence.  The  skepticism  of  this  conclusion,  how- 
ever, is  not  very  "mitigated"  as  regards  the  needs 
of  thought.  It  leaves  the  mind  a  house  divided 
against  itself. 

Descartes,  also  felt  the  force  of  the  critical  objec- 
tions to  the  objectivity  of  our  knowledge,  and  rested 
his  confidence  in  the  actuality  of  the  physical  world, 
and  the  essentially  true  representation  of  it  in  clear 
and  distinct  ideas,  on  his  faith  in  God.  He  first  es- 
tablished, as  he  believed,  the  existence  of  God  by 
considerations  drawn  from  the  nature  of  his  own 
consciousness  and  its  ideas,  and  then  argued  that 
our  bodies,  the  earth,  and  the  stars,  and  the  like,  are 
all  to  be  accounted  actual,  and  our  ideas  of  them,  so 
far  as  these  are  clear  and  distinct,  to  be  considered 
true,  on  the  ground  that  the  perfect  Being  to  whom 
we  owe  everything  would  not  put  us  in  hopeless  sub- 
jection to  error.9  Hume  refers  to  this  way  out  as  an 
"unexpected  circuit,"  and  certainly  it  has  not  proved 
a  way  passable  for  most  minds.  Descartes'  argu- 
ments for  the  existence  of  God  are  generally  ac- 
counted very  inconclusive.  Nor  does  it  appear  that 
the  veracity  of  the  Deity  is  involved  in  the  truth  of 
clear  ideas,  since  it  is  not  essential  to  human  welfare 
that  we  should  have  a  knowledge  of  the  actual  exist- 
ence and  nature  of  the  physical  world.  Berkeley,  for 

•  "Method,"  Pt.  IV.  It  should  be  added  that  Descartes  looked 
upon  ordinary  sense  qualities  as  confused  ideas.  It  was  only  the 
quantitative  representation  of  the  external  world— in  terms  of 
number  and  arrangement — that  he  held  to  be  clear  and  distinct, 
and  therefore  divinely  guaranteed. 


226  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

example,  lived  a  useful  and  happy  life  in  entire  dis- 
belief in  its  existence. 

The  Scotch  school  of  realists  took  another  path. 
They  maintained  the  actuality  of  the  external  world 
on  the  ground  that  every  peripheral  sensation  is  a 
trustworthy  sign  of  a  corresponding  physical  object. 
When  challenged  for  the  proof  of  this,  the  representa- 
tives of  this  school10  replied  that  common  sense  made 
it  evident.  Everything,  and  especially  everything 
that  the  mind  perceives  clearly  and  distinctly,  must 
have  a  cause,  and  this  cause  in  the  case  of  perceptions 
must  be  a  corresponding  outer  object.  But  Berkeley, 
as  much  as  Reid,  believed  that  perceptions  are  caus- 
ally produced,  and  their  cause  he  believed  he  had 
found  in  experience,  namely  mind,  or  spirit.  We 
know  that  some  ideas  are  mind-made;  in  the  absence 
of  knowledge  to  the  contrary  it  is  reasonable  to  hold, 
he  maintained,  that  all  ideas  are  so  made. 

For  the  Scotch  school  to  maintain,  on  the  contrary, 
that  the  cause  of  the  ideas  must  be  just  what  the 
ordinary  man  supposes — some  external  unperceived 
and  unproved  object — is  not  reasoning,  but  at  best 
over-emphasized  theorizing.  It  is  what  Kant  called 
dogmatism,  a  mere  insistence  upon  common 
opinion. 

Are  we  then,  if  we  would  avoid  philosophical  skep- 
ticism, shut  up  to  the  subjective  idealist  view  that 
objects  of  sense  are  merely  more  or  less  permanent 
clusters  of  sensations,  and  entirely  mind-made?  So 

10  Reid  and  his  successors.  Thomas  Reid  (1710-1796),  was  the 
chief  founder  of  the  Scottish  "common-sense"  school  of  philosophy. 
He  was  professor  of  moral  philosophy  at  Glasgow. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  227 

it  has  seemed  to  many  philosophers  from  Berkeley's 
day  to  our  own.  For  some  time  past,  however,  an 
antagonistic,  quasi-realistic  influence  has  been  gath- 
ering head  within  the  pale  of  science.  Science,  indeed, 
has  taken  no  direct  part  in  this  dispute.  As  we  have 
seen,  it  has  contented  itself  with  postulating,  not 
strictly  assuming,  the  more  or  less  independent  ex- 
istence of  the  physical  world.  The  term  phenomenon, 
so  common  hi  its  discussioons,  reveals  its  logical 
position.  The  word  means  something  that  appears, 
and  an  appearance  manifestly  may  be  an  existence 
in  itself  or  the  representation  of  an  existence  beyond 
itself  or  the  pure  creation  of  the  mind.  Among  these 
possible  meanings  science  makes  no  choice.  Never- 
theless, science  has  had  so  much  success  in  investi- 
gating "phenomena;"  it  has  found  so  many  hitherto 
unknown,  and  has  framed  from  them  such  an  exten- 
sive edifice  of  valid  laws  and  successful  agencies  of 
control;  that  is,  its  postulate  of  actuality  has  worked 
so  well,  has  been  borne  out  so  well  by  results,  that 
ordinarily  it  forgets  that  it  is  working  on  a  postulate, 
and  tacitly  regards  the  "phenomena"  as  either  ob- 
jective existences  or  functions  thereof.  To  put  the 
situation  in  another  way,  the  fixed,  mentally  uncon- 
trollable, objective,  part  of  knowledge — facts  and 
laws — has  increased  enormously  within  the  past  two 
centuries;  so  that  now  the  man  of  science  has  a  strong 
sense  of  an  established  order  of  things  beyond  him- 
self, a  sense  that  is  not  satisfied  by  the  metaphysical 
explanation  that  it  is  all  a  mere  mental  construction 
from  top  to  bottom,  facts  not  excepted.  If  the  world 
order  is  mental,  it  is  at  least  an  order,  and  a  very  ob- 


228  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

jective  one,  one  making  substantially  identical  de- 
mands upon  all  inquirers. 

Another,  and  an  important,  realistic  factor  in 
present-day  metaphysical  thought  is  the  new  prom- 
inence which  science  has  given  to  energy,  and  its 
location  of  it  within  the  objects  which  manifest  it. 
Things  that  work  changes  do  not  seem  to  be  mere 
appearances,  but  rather  to  have  much  the  same  sort 
of  claim  to  the  rank  of  existences  in  their  own  right 
that  we  have  ourselves.  The  influence  of  this  real- 
istic drift  within  the  confines  of  science  has  been  felt 
by  philosophy  in  two  ways:  (1)  Most  thinkers  of  the 
general  school  of  Berkeley  now  call  themselves  ob- 
jective  idealists.  They  concede  the  objective  reality 
of  material  things,  while  still  maintaining  that  the 
essence  of  those  things  is  psychic.  (2)  Others,  being 
strongly  impressed  with  the  value  of  the  methods  of 
the  physical  sciences,  have  examined  afresh  and 
with  greater  rigor,  the  traditional  teaching  that  per- 
ception must  be  primarily  an  awareness  of  images 
within  the  organism.  It  has  always  been  usual  to 
think  of  perception  in  terms  of  visual  or  tactual 
processes,  and  to  conceive  of  consciousness  as  immedi- 
ate vision  or  touch  of  the  object  by  the  mind.  This 
evidently  implies  that  the  mind  is  an  inner  observer, 
apparently  occupying  space,  within,  say,  the  brain, 
an  observer  able  to  see  and  feel  an  object  if  it  comes 
close  enough.  From  this  point  of  view  Hume's 
argument  drawn  from  the  table's  changefulness  of 
aspect,  is  perfectly  conclusive.  We  cannot  believe 
that  the  actual  table  transforms  itself  in  such  Protean 
ways,  according  as  we  move  toward  it  or  away  from 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  229 

it,  or  that  for  a  hundred  observers  it  has  as  many 
different  shapes.  What  the  mind  perceives  in  that 
case  must  be  a  mere  image  formed  within  the  body 
by  the  mechanism  of  eye,  optic  nerve,  and  so  forth. 

But  why  should  we  think  of  perception  on  the  basis 
of  such  an  artificial  hypothesis?  There  is  nothing 
to  indicate  that  the  mind  is  a  kind  of  sprite  or  kobold 
located  in  the  dark  somewhere  under  the  skull;  nor 
will  all  perception  bear  description  in  terms  of  such 
picture  viewing  or  surface  feeling.  When  we  listen 
to  an  oration,  to  music,  or  to  the  roar  of  a  torrent, 
we  do  not  think  of  the  sounds  as  being  objects  which 
confront  us,  nor  yet  as  images  of  such  objects.  Neither 
do  they  bear  any  likeness  to  tactual  images — such,  for 
example,  as  we  may  gain  by  the  pressure  of  our  fingers 
upon  the  violin  strings  or  the  speeding  water.  We  may 
indeed  associate  visualized  objects  with  the  sounds, 
but  that  is  only  when  we  know  something  of  the  causes 
of  the  sounds  from  other  sources.  The  like  may  be 
said  of  the  senses  of  smell  and  taste  and  temperature. 

Suppose  that  instead  of  conceiving  of  perception 
as  the  immediate  vision  of  an  object,  or  as  a  kind  of 
tactual  awareness  of  it,  by  an  inner  self  confined  in 
some  recess  of  the  body — suppose  we  think  of  it  as 
merely  the  setting  up  of  dynamic  relations  between 
our  organisms  and  other  existences,  these  relations 
varying  hi  character  according  to  the  sense  involved. 
The  interconnections  between  a  bell  and  the  cortex 
of  the  brain  will,  of  course,  be  different  when  we  see 
the  bell  in  sufficient  light  from  what  they  are  when 
we  hear  it,  or  lay  our  hands  upon  it,  at  night.  Be  the 
character  of  these  relations — the  processes  of  stimulus 


230  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

and  reaction — what  they  may,  they  may  all  of  them 
be  accounted  parts  of  the  perception  process,  provided 
they  enable  us  to  appreciate  the  object — that  is,  to  get 
suitably  varied  and  modified  feelings  of  pleasure 
and  pain  through  our  connection  with  it — and  also 
enable  us  to  react  to  it  successfully.  When  perception 
is  regarded  in  this  way,  the  whole  difficulty  as  to  the 
possibility  of  knowing  external  objects  seems  to  dis- 
appear. That  cognitive  relations  should  be  modified 
by  change  of  position  on  the  part  of  our  bodies  is  in 
accord  with  all  our  knowledge  of  relations, — for  ex- 
ample, the  dynamic  relation  which  we  call  gravita- 
tion, which  increases  inversely  with  the  square  of  the 
distance.  On  this  view  the  so-called  mental ' '  images' ' 
— really  perceptions — which  psychology  deals  with 
become  effects  in  our  central  nervous  system,  made 
(in  the  last  analysis)  by  processes  entering  the  or- 
ganism from  without.  They  are  not  intermediate 
stages  of  the  process  of  knowledge  but  the  final  stage, 
not  things  known  but  the  knowledge  itself,  not  ob- 
jective but  subjective.11 

11  The  image  formed  on  the  retina  of  the  eye  in  visual  perception 
is,  of  course,  an  intermediate  stage  in  the  knowing  process,  but  it 
is  a  purely  mechanical  one.  It  is  itself  never  an  object  of  sensory 
consciousness,  and  certainly  is  not  the  image  the  mind  is  said  to 
perceive.  The  proof  of  this  statement  is  the  fact  that  when  there 
are  certain  lesions  in  either  the  optic  nerve  or  the  occipital  lobe  of 
the  brain,  there  is  no  vision,  even  though  the  eye  and  the  retinal 
image  be  perfect,  and  the  person  otherwise  in  normal  condition, 
physical  and  mental.  The  relation  of  the  retinal  image  to  percep- 
tion seems  to  be  analogous  to  that  of  the  camera!  image  in  photog- 
raphy to  the  picture  afterward  developed  on  the  plate.  In  neither 
case  does  the  final  result  know  the  intervening  image  which  was  a 
part  of  the  process  by  which  it  was  produced. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  231 

It  may  be  urged  that  this  realistic  account  of  per- 
ception is  no  genuine  account  of  perception  at  all; 
that,  in  fact,  it  omits  the  very  heart  and  mystery  of 
the  process.  There  is  no  doubt  truth  in  this  objec- 
tion on  the  psychological  side.  The  description  is 
highly  schematic  and  vague;  it  leaves  large  and  im- 
portant gaps  for  the  psychologist  to  fill  in.  On  the 
logical  side,  however,  the  realist  is  able  to  urge  that 
his  description  includes  the  two  chief  functions  of 
consciousness,  satisfaction  and  successful  reaction, 
and  what  more  (if  as  much  as  that)  is  included 
in  the  notion  of  seeing  or  touching  something  in  the 
brain? 

Now,  if  the  hypothesis  of  brain  sight  or  brain 
touch  be  given  up,  there  seems  to  be  no  longer  any 
reason, — aside  from  cases  of  introspection — for  re- 
garding the  objects  of  perception  as  sensory  images, 
or  purely  psychical  phenomena.  If  to  be  in  a  cer- 
tain kind  of  dynamic  relation  or  mediate  continuity 
with  an  object,  that  is,  connected  with  it  by  proper 
continuous  impulsive  processes — if  this  constitutes 
perception,  then  the  object  may  be  a  wish  (purely 
private  and  psychic),  a  cramp  in  a  muscle  (private 
but  physical),  a  tree  on  the  lawn  (physical  and  ex- 
ternal), or  a  star  in  a  remote  constellation,  and  the 
relational  connection,  or  rather  the  final  stage  of  it, 
will  in  each  case  be  perception  or  awareness.  The 
location  of  the  object  is  never  explicitly  given  in  the 
sensory  foundation  of  any  perception,  though  there 
are  certain  features,  or  "signs",  in  the  underlying 
sensations,  such  as  contrasts,  relative  positions, 
efforts,  durations,  and  so  forth,  in  which  location  is 


232  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

generally  given  implicitly;  that  is,  a  critical  compari- 
son of  these  with  the  "  local  signs"  in  other  expe- 
riences enables  the  percipient  to  determine  the  loca- 
tion of  the  object  with  reasonable  success. 

It  appears  then  to  be  perfectly  possible  to  answer 
the  question  as  to  the  actuality  of  the  external  world 
in  the  affirmative,  though  it  may  not  be  possible  to 
offer  any  argument  that  will  convince  the  subjective 
idealist  of  the  truth  of  that  answer.  For  example, 
the  very  pertinent  fact  that,  irrespective  of  their 
wishes  regarding  it,  different  observers  agree  sub- 
stantially in  their  descriptions  of  a  given  "external" 
object,  is  not  considered  proof  of  externality  by  the 
subjective  idealist.  He  finds  an  explanation  of  it  in 
the  likeness  of  nature  and  conditions  hi  the  different 
observers.  One  may  take  either  side  of  this  question ; 
but  the  fact  that  the  postulate  of  actuality  has  worked 
so  well,  and  served  as  the  basis  of  so  much  progress 
in  knowledge,  will  doubtless  lead  an  increasing 
proportion  of  thinkers  to  adopt  some  realistic 
view. 

Relativity  of  Knowledge. — Granting  the  actuality 
of  the  outer  world,  a  further  question,  and  one  of 
much  greater  age,  remains:  Can  we  know  that  world 
as  it  actually  is  in  itself  f  Incidentally  this  question 
has  received  some  discussion  in  these  pages  already; 
for  we  have  seen  how  Hume  reached  the  essentially 
skeptical  position  that  in  deference  to  common  sense 
we  must  believe  hi  a  world  beyond  the  mind,  though 
reason  affirms  that  we  have  no  adequate  ground  for 
so  doing.  Kant,  who  was  the  next  great  critical 
philosopher,  limited  the  authority  of  common  sense 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  233 

more  rigorously.  Something,  he  maintained,  must 
exist  apart  from  ourselves  in  order  to  make  upon  us 
the  manifold  impressions  (perceptions)  of  which 
we  are  aware,  but  in  the  nature  of  the  case  that  some- 
thing— the  "thing  hi  itself" — is  entirely  different 
from  our  thought  of  it,  and  is  essentially  unknowable. 
This  must  be  so,  he  held,  because  there  are  evidently 
unconscious  processes  in  the  mind — forms  of  instinc- 
tive and  purely  mechanical  mental  activity — which 
work  over  and  modify  the  material  (stimuli)  that 
comes  into  the  mind  from  without  before  we  are  aware 
of  that  material.  That  is,  when  we  perceive  an  ob- 
ject it  has  already  been  transformed  by  the  uncon- 
scious mechanism  of  the  mind,  and  is  what  the  mind 
has  made  it,  not  what  the  "thing  in  itself"  actually 
is.  The  object  perceived  is  doubtless  as  different 
from  the  "thing  in  itself"  as  a  costly  vase  is  from  the 
lump  of  clay  from  which  it  was  formed;  probably  it 
is  far  more  different.  This  is  virtually  the  conclu- 
sion to  which  Protagoras  and  his  fellow  Sophists 
came  in  the  fifth  century  B.  c.,  and  is  a  radical  state- 
ment of  the  philosophical  principle  known  as  the 
relativity  of  knowledge,  the  principle  that  the  mind 
itself  contributes  essential  and,  indeed,  transforming 
elements  to  the  objects  which  it  knows.  In  this 
extreme  form,  however,  it  has  never  received  univer- 
sal acceptance  among  philosophers,  though  for  a  cen- 
tury after  Kant  its  vogue  was  immense. 

Primary  and  Secondary  Properties.— Both  in 
ancient  and  modern  times  philosophy,  hi  the  persons 
of  its  greater  representatives,  has  generally  adopted  a 
less  extreme  view,  and  sanctioned  a  distinction  which 


234  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

is  now  associated  with  the  name  of  John  Locke,12 
the  distinction  between  the  primary  and  secondary 
properties  of  things.  In  knowing  the  primary  qual- 
ities of  objects  it  is  held — and  physical  science  tacitly 
accepts  this  view — we  know  things  as  they  actually 
are  in  themselves,  whereas  hi  knowing  their  second- 
ary qualities  we  merely  know  their  effects  upon  us,  and 
in  these  respects  our  knowledge  of  them  is  purely 
relative.  Now,  the  primary  properties  of  things  are 
those  which  have  been  conceived  rather  than  per- 
ceived by  the  mind,  properties  which  on  a  critical 
view  of  experience  it  concludes  must  characterize 
things  in  themselves;  that  is,  they  are  of  a  logical 
rather  than  a  sensory  character.  They  are  of  two 
kinds:  the  mathematical  properties  of  number  and 
extension  (including  figure)  and  the  dynamic  proper- 
ties of  resistance  (impenetrability)  and  impulsiveness 
(elasticity,  chemical  affinity,  and  whatever  issues  in 
motion).  These  two  groups  are  the  properties  with 
which  physical  science  is  chiefly  concerned.  The 
ordinary  sensory  qualities  of  things,  such  as  color, 
sound,  odor,  flavor,  warmth,  etc.,  Locke  called  sec- 
ondary, holding  that  these  are  most  reasonably  to  be 
regarded  as  results — effects  of  a  combination  of  the 
activities  of  the  object  itself  (the  stimulus)  and  the 
reaction  of  our  organisms. 

This  is  a  distinction  of  large  practical  value,  as  is 
evident  from  the  fact  that  science  makes  use  of  it, 
though  its  theoretical  validity  has  been  sharply  dis- 

"  John  Locke  (1632-1704)  was  a  noted  English  philosopher  of  large 
ability.  His  originality  is  disputed,  but  of  his  great  influence  on 
subsequent  thought  there  can  be  no  question. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  235 

puted.  With  our  present  knowledge  of  the  mechan- 
ism of  sensation  we  cannot  conceive  of  the  secondary 
qualities  as  existing  without  other  factors  than  the 
activity  of  the  object  itself,  factors  such  as  ether  waves, 
air  waves,  and  above  all  a  highly  complex  percipient 
organism.  However  green  the  grass  ordinarily,  it 
is  apt  to  be  golden  in  the  afternoon  light,  while  it 
has  no  color  at  all  at  night.  A  cloudless  sky  is  likely 
to  be  blue,  but  it  may  also,  as  in  the  west  just  after 
sundown,  present  a  spectrum  of  hues  ending  in  dark- 
est red.  Nor  is  the  ringing  of  a  bell  the  sole  cause  of 
the  sound  we  hear.  Without  the  concurrent  agency 
of  the  atmosphere,  there  would  be  no  sound,  as  may 
easily  be  proved  by  ringing  the  bell  in  a  vacuum. 
Furthermore,  we  cannot  conceive  of  all  the  bells  on 
earth,  though  all  rocked  at  once  by  an  earthquake,  as 
making  any  real  sound,  if  there  were  no  ears  to  be 
reached  by  the  ah*  waves  they  set  moving.  It  thus 
appears  that  sensory  knowledge,  constituted  as  it  is 
of  secondary  qualities,  is  never  a  copy  or  reproduc- 
tion of  the  situation  hi  any  external  object  by  itself 
alone.  It  is  an  inner  mental  product  due  to  the  action 
of  the  object  and  cooperating  agencies  upon  the  organ- 
ism and  the  reaction  of  the  central  nervous  system 
thereto. 

None  the  less  the  secondary  properties  may 
evidently  for  practical  purposes  be  treated  as  be- 
longing to  the  object  itself,  for  there  must  be  in  it 
some  specific  arrangement,  or  organization,  of 
dynamic  units  (molecules,  etc.)  which  is  their  indis- 
pensable condition  or  (partial)  cause.  The  question 
as  to  their  true  theoretical  locus  is  in  dispute.  For 


236  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

the  naive  realist  the  property  of  an  object  is  properly 
something  in  it,  some  essential  part  of  its  own  nature 
or  structure,  a  characteristic  which  should  be  care- 
fully distinguished  from  the  sensation  which  that 
property  causes  in  us.  The  whiteness  of  snow,  he 
insists  is  a  permanent  situation  or  arrangement  in 
the  snow  itself,  a  matter  of  geometrical  and  dynamic 
structure,  and  by  no  means  the  same  thing  as  the 
effect  which  that  situation  produces  in  us,  an  effect 
which  should  be  called,  not  whiteness,  but  the 
sensation  of  whiteness.  On  this  (realistic)  view  the 
distinction  between  primary  and  secondary  qualities 
becomes  a  relative  one,  the  former  being  simply 
those  properties  which  we  find  ourselves  obliged  to 
attribute  to  all  material  things,  and  the  latter  those 
special  types  of  the  primary  qualities  the  presence 
of  which  distinguishes  one  substance  from  another. 
Both  kinds  of  property  are  essentially  logical  rather 
than  empirical. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  objective  idealist,  while 
conceding  that  snow  is  white  for  practical  purposes, 
since  in  the  mass  it  always  has  a  characteristic 
arrangement  of  its  crystalline  particles  which,  in 
ordinary  light,  causes  in  a  normal  human  percipient 
the  sensation  of  white,  yet  contends  that  whiteness  as 
such  is,  strictly  speaking,  not  a  situation,  but  a 
temporary  phenomenon,  an  event,  and  one  which 
takes  place  in  the  organism,  and  nowhere  else.  It  is 
there  that  the  dynamic  situation  arises  which  yields 
the  secondary  property  of  whiteness.  This  conten- 
tion he  supports,  not  only  by  the  unquestioned  fact 
that  ordinary  light  and  a  normal  percipient  organism 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  237 

are  necessary  for  its  existence,  but  also  by  the  further 
fact  that  the  whiteness  diminishes  in  degree,  and 
finally  vanishes,  as  inspection  of  the  snow  becomes 
more  minute,  as,  for  example,  under  the  microscope. 
That  is,  snow  is  not  white  when  the  inspection  is  so 
close  as  to  eliminate  the  influence  of  the  combined 
refractions  of  many  crystalline  surfaces;  on  the 
contrary,  it  has  as  little  color  as  ice  or  glass.  It 
is  evident  that  this  dispute  is  essentially  one  as  to 
the  best  use  of  the  term  property.  It  is  probably  not 
very  important  which  usage  is  adopted;  but  it  would 
be  a  distinct  gain  for  philosophy  if  one  of  the  two 
could  gain  general  acceptance,  and  so  ambiguity  and 
needless  discussion  be  avoided. 

Reference  has  been  made  to  the  fact  that  the  dis- 
tinction between  primary  and  secondary  qualities  has 
been  challenged  on  the  theoretical  side.  It  has  been 
urged  repeatedly,  from  Berkeley's  time  to  the  pres- 
ent, that  the  primary  qualities,  also,  are  mere  effects 
made  upon  us  by  agents  which  themselves  are  never 
given  in  experience.  There  is  ground  for  this  claim 
in  the  somewhat  uncritical  fashion  in  which  primary 
qualities  have  often  been  enumerated.  Locke,  for 
example,  counts  solidity  among  the  primary  qualities, 
and  describes  it  in  such  a  way  as  to  suggest  that  what 
he  means  is  the  sense  of  resistance  we  have  in  en- 
countering material  objects,  which  is,  of  course  a  sen- 
sory or  secondary  property.  What  he  had  in  mind, 
however,  was  probably,  not  the  feeling  of  resistance, 
but  the  abstract  notion  of  impenetrability,  or  ex- 
clusive occupancy  of  space,  which  is  not  an  impres- 
sion of  sense  but  a  product  of  thought.  Properly 


238  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

stated,  the  primary  qualities  of  objects  represent  the 
efforts,  and  apparently  so  far  as  they  go  the  successful 
efforts,  of  science  to  ascertain  by  mental  construction 
the  character  of  things  in  themselves;  that  is,  to 
eliminate  from  our  perceptions  the  elements  due  to 
the  reactions  of  our  organisms,  and  then  to  separate 
in  thought  the  activities  of  the  objects  themselves 
from  the  concurrent  agency  of  media,  and  so  forth. 
They  are  not  direct  percepts,  still  less  mere  sensa- 
tions, but  are  the  logical  results  of  working  over  ana- 
lytically and  synthetically  in  selective  comparisons 
a  large  number  of  perceptions.  For  example,  aware- 
ness of  things  in  number  relations — as  one,  two,  three, 
etc. — involves  critical  comparison  of  and  abstraction 
from  various  experiences.  Similarly  extension,  mo- 
tion, and  energy  are  properties  attributed  to  objects 
by  reflective  thought  after  a  critical  comparison  of 
many  sensory  experiences. 

It  may  still  be  urged,  however,  that  the  most 
thoroughly  criticized  primary  properties  are  still 
mere  relative  knowledge,  because  with  all  of  reflective 
thought's  comparing  and  analyzing  and  abstracting, 
it  never  has  anything  but  sensory  experience,  that  is, 
relative  knowledge,  as  its  material,  and  cannot  pos- 
sibly transcend  that  and  reach  something  essentially 
different,  that  is,  those  ultimate  causes  of  experience 
which  themselves  are  never  present  in  experience. 
This  is  searching  criticism;  yet  it  rests  upon  an  as- 
sumption, and  an  assumption  which  appears  to  be 
needless.  It  is  the  assumption  that  the  external 
causes  of  our  experience  are  essentially  different  from 
all  our  experience,  including  our  experience  of  our- 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  239 

selves.  But  why  make  such  an  assumption?  It  seems 
far  more  probable  that  man  is  a  child  of  nature,  and 
consequently  more  or  less  akin  to  all  other  natural 
objects.  If,  as  is  likely,  both  man  and  the  substan- 
tial objects  of  his  knowledge  are  dynamic  and  impul- 
sive in  essence,  it  does  not  appear  why  he  may  not 
succeed  in  at  least  partially  comprehending  and  ap- 
preciating those  objects  as  they  are  in  themselves 
by  using  his  immediate  acquaintance  with  himself  as 
a  means  of  interpretation. 

Primary  Qualities  not  the  Sum  Total  of  the  Exter- 
nal World. — On  the  other  hand,  it  is  an  evident  case 
of  the  fallacy  of  simplification13  to  assume,  as  is  not 
infrequently  done,  that  a  complete  statement  of  the 
primary  qualities  of  things  would  be  a,  full  description 
of  the  external  world.14  Those  qualities  are  all  of  them 
constructs  from  effects  produced  in  our  organisms 
by  external  agencies,  and  there  is  not  the  least  reason 
to  suppose  that,  directly  or  indirectly,15  our  organisms 
are  sensitive  to  all  that  goes  on  in  the  natural  world. 
Indeed,  analogy  from  such  shortcomings  as  our  lack  of 
an  electrical  sense  would  lead  us  to  think  the  very 
contrary.  Existence  beyond  ourselves  may  well  be 
far  more  various  and  rich  than  the  present  scientific 
descriptions  of  things  would  lead  us  to  think;  16  in 

11  Cf.  p.  149,  supra.  14  Cf.  Whetham,  o.  c.,  p.  11. 

"An  example  of  indirect  susceptibility  to  natural  processes  is 
that  of  the  accumulation  of  effects  of  exceedingly  weak  or  ultra 
light  waves,  which  are  themselves  imperceptible,  upon  a  photo- 
graphic plate,  where  their  combined  effect  at  length  becomes  per- 
ceptible to  the  eye. 

14  Cf.  the  remark  which  Shakspere  puts  in  the  mouth  of  Hamlet: 
"There  are  more  things  in  heaven  and  earth,  Horatio,  than  are 
dreamt  of  in  your  philosophy." 


240  BASAL  PRINCIPLES 

fact  it  must  be  so  if  our  human  nature  in  all  its 
phases  is  to  be  traced  back  to  the  activities  of  the 
natural  world.  In  this  conclusion,  with  its  wide 
possibilities  of  other  existences  and  stages  of  being, 
critical  theology  finds  its  field  of  inquiry  and  faith. 

"But  beyond  the  bright  search-lights  of  science, 

Out  of  sight  of  the  windows  of  sense, 
Old  riddles  still  bid  us  defiance, 

Old  questions  of  Why  and  of  Whence. 
There  fail  all  sure  means  of  trial, 

There  end  all  the  pathways  we've  trod, 
Where  man,  by  belief  or  denial, 
Is  weaving  the  purpose  of  God." 

Whetham,  o.  c.,  p.  10 

EXERCISES 

1.  Describe  the  mechanism  of  perception  of  one  of  the  senses 
(Cf.,  for  example,  the  account  of  vision  or  hearing  in  a  good 
encyclopedia  or  physics  text-book,  or  Tyndall  "On  Sound," 
pp.  73  f,  77  f).    Show  what  the  external  cause  of  the  color  or 
sound  must  be  and  how  it  differs  from  the  sensation  (color, 
sound,  etc.),  itself  as  we  experience  it,  and  bring  out  the  dis- 
tinction in  this  case  between  the  primary  and  the  secondary 
properties. 

2.  Summarize  as  cogently  as  you  can  Hume's  argument  to 
prove  that  philosophical  skepticism  as  to  the  senses  is  invincible. 
(Cf.  "Enquiry,"  etc.,  sec.  12,  Pt.  I.) 

3.  Make  a  careful  synopsis  of  the  arguments  by  which  Berk- 
eley ("Prins.  of  Hum.  Knowl.,"  fllf  1-41)  seeks  to  prove  that 
only  spirits  exist  in  their  own  right,  all  the  objects  of  sense  being 
merely  the  spirit's  "ideas." 

4.  Do  the  same  with  Royce's  argument  to  the  same  effect  in 
his  "Spirit  of  Modern  Philosophy,"  Lee.  XI. 

5.  Outline  carefully  the  line  of  thought  by  which  Descartes 
comes  to  a  realistic  conclusion  in  his  "Discourse  on  Method," 
Pt.  IV. 


THE  EXTERNAL  WORLD  241 

6.  State  in  detail  the  main  points  of  Huxley's  discussion  of  the 
problem  of  knowledge  of  existences  independent  of  your  thought 
of  them  in  his  essay  on  "On  Sensation,"  etc.    (Cf.  "Pop.  Science 
Monthly,"  IV,  p.  86  f,  or  "19th  Century,"  V,  p.  97  ff.) 

7.  Give  Huxley's  reasons  for  holding  that  Descartes'  teach- 
ings contained  the  germs  of  both  idealism  and  materialistic 
realism.    (Cf.  "Method  and  Results,"  essay  IV.) 

8.  Summarize  chapter  VII  of  J.  A.  Thomson's  "Introduction 
to  Science." 


INDEX 


Absolute,  The,  73  f. 
Adjustment,  139 
Agreement,  Test  of,  64,  68 
Analogy,  Scientific,  58  ff. 
Analysis,  26,  30  f . 
Animism,  81 
Assumptions,  27,  195  ff. 
Atomism,  Ancient,  93  f.,  105  f. 
Axioms,  197 

Basal  Principles,  193  ff .,  198  ff. 

Causes,  37, 144  f.  See  also  Final 
Causes 

Certainty,  7,  73  f. 

Change,  Problem  of,  80  f . 

Children's  Crusade,  42 

Clearness,  Need  of,  65 

Composite  Structure  of  Physical 
Objects,  82  f. 

Conservation,  of  Matter,  91; 
of  Energy,  112,  191 

Constancy  of  Nature  of  Physical 
Objects,  82  f.,  114 

Contemplative  Motive  of  Sci- 
ence, 14  f . 

Continuity,  Principle  of,  141;  of 
Substance,  99 

Correlation  of  Energy,  115 

Dangers  of  One-sided  Motives, 
19  f.;  of  Mental  Construction, 
42  f. 

Data,  35  f .    See  Facts 


Degradation  of  Energy,  119 
Diffusiveness  of  Energy,  118 
Descartes'  Rules  of  Method,  31, 

35,  65,  71;  Practical  Maxims, 

195 

Determinism,  156  f.,  186 
Discovery,  Method  of,  38 
Discreteness,  99 
Dynamism,  108  ff. 

Efficiency,  Seat  of,  131 

Electricity,  127,  129 

Electronic  Theory,  67,  126  f. 

Elements,  83  f. 

Empirical  Principles,  25,  77  ff. 

Ends.     See  Final  Causes 

Energy,  108  ff.,  145;  and  Motion, 
121;  Hume's  criticism  of,  109; 
Potential,  115;  Theories  ae  to, 
122  ff.;  Unavailable,  118 

Ether,  68,  129 

Evolution,  173ff.;  According  to 
Lamarck,  177;  to  Darwin, 
180  f.;  Cosmic,  185  f.;  Spen- 
cer's, 188;  Teleological,  187 

External  World,  Actuality  of, 
219  ff. 

Facts,  35  f.,  45  f.,  53,  205 
Faith  Involved  in  Science,  199 
Final     Causes,     163  f.,     (167) 

211  f. 

Force.     See  Energy 
"Freaks  of  Nature,"  59 


243 


244 


INDEX 


Gods  of  Rome,  51 
Gravitation,  87,  127 

Heredity,  177,  182  f. 
Historical  Facts,  7  f . 

Idealism,  220  ff.,  236  f. 

Ideality  of  Science,  5  f . 

Ideas,  Interpretative,  24  f.,  35, 
42,  45  f.,  50,  53,  58  ff.,  154; 
Platonic,  160  f . 

Immortality,  216  f. 

Imperceptible,  The,  84,  116 

Indestructibility,  of  Matter,  91; 
of  Energy,  112,  125 

Individuals,  Physical,  132 

Indivisibility,  93 

Inertia,  87 

Instruction,  Method  of,  38 

Instrumental  Aspect  of  Knowl- 
edge, 19 

Interaction,  140 

Intuition,  Intellectual,  70  f. 

Knowledge,  Absolute,  73 f.;  Ap- 
preciative, 167;  as  Separate 
Facts,  53;  Descriptive,  167; 
Immediate,  71  f.;  Love  of,  15; 
Manufactured,  33  f.;  Objects 
of,  ideal,  220 f.;  Process  of, 
223 f~  226 ff.;  Relative,  232 

Laws,  Natural,  47,  51,  153  ff.; 
as  Brute  Facts,  156;  as  Decrees 
of  God,  161;  as  Ideal  Exist- 
ences, 160 

Life,  164  f . 

Mass,  88 

Materialism,  105,  147  f . 

Materials  of  Thought,  35  f . 


Matter,  79  ff.,  85  ff.,  123  f.,  127; 

as  Underlying  Substance,  85, 

92,  98;  Principles  of,  90  f. 
Measurements,  102 
Mechanism,  135  ff.,  169,  174 
Mental  Construction,  33  f .,  45, 

49,  205 

Methods,  25  f.,  30  ff.,  38 
Metric  System,  103  f. 
Motion  and  Energy,  121 
Motives  of  Science,  13 
Mutability,  of  Matter,  90;  of 

Energy,  115 

Naturalism,  158  f . 
Natural  Selection,  179  ff. 
Necessity,  156 

Ontogeny,  175  f. 
Organization  of  Scientific  Knowl- 
edge, 8  f. 
Origin  of  Species,  173  ff. 

Parsimony,  Law  of,  48 

Personal  Agency,  145 

Pessimism,  216 

Philosophy  and  Science,  10  ff. 

Phylogeny.  See  Origin  of  Species 

Positivism,  Scientific,  45  ff .;  Phil- 
osophic, 52  ff . 

Postulates,  28,  143,  195  ff., 
198  ff. 

Potency,  115 

Power.    See  Energy 

Practical  Motive,  16  f. 

Pragmatic,  The,  73  f.,  (19) 

Precision  of  Science,  4  f . 

Primary  Properties,  233,  (96) 

Principles,  Nature  and  Kinds  of, 
24  f .,  35 

Purpose.    See  Final  Cause 


INDEX 


245 


Quantity,  99  ff. 
Quebec  Bridge,  43 

Rationality  of  the  World,  203  ff. 

Realism,  226  ff.,  235  f. 

Reification  of  Abstractions,  50  f. 

Relativity,  of  Scientific  State- 
ments, 104;  of  Knowledge, 
232,  238 

Science,  and  Philosophy,  10 ff.; 
as  Quantitative,  101;  How 
Distinguished,  Iff.;  Motives 
of,  13  ff.;  Results,  4  ff.,  77ff.; 
Tests  of,  67  ff. 

Secondary  Properties,  233,  (96) 

Selection.  See  Natural  Selec- 
tion 

Sequences,  144 

Simplification,  Fallacy  of,  149  f., 
239 

Skepticism,  Philosophic,  224  f . 

Space,  203,  220 

Standard  Units,  102 


Static  Conception  of  Existence, 

20,75 

Struggle  for  Existence,  180  f . 
Stuff,  Mother,  of  the  World,  81 
Synthesis,  27,  32 

Time,  203,  220 

Transferability,  of  Matter,  90; 
of  Energy,  125 

Uniformity  of  Nature,  27,  143, 

209 

Unity,  133,  137 
Universality,  of  Science,  8 
Universe,  Is  the  Physical  U.  the 

All?  120,  239 
Unknowable,    The,    52  f.f    191, 

213 
Use  and  Disuse  of  Parts,  177  f. 

Values,  160  ff.,  215 
Variation,  Organic,  182 

Weight.  87 


